li) 


fi55 


U.C.  BERKELEY  LIBRARIES 


University  of  California  •  Berkeley 


THE  GO^TSCEIPTION. 


ALSO 


SPEECHES 


OF    THE 


HON.  W.  D.  KELLEY,  OF  PENNSYLVANIA, 


THE  HOUSE  OF  REPRESENTATIVES, 


ON 


THE  CONSCRIPTION; 
THE  WAY  TO  ATTAIN  AND  SECUEE  PEACE ; 

AND    ON 

AEMING  THE  NEGROES. 

WITH    A 

LETTER  FROM  SECRETARY  CHASE. 


PHILADELPHIA: 
PRINTED   FOR   GRATUITOUS   DISTRIBUTION. 

1863. 


THE  DEMOCRATIC  CENTRAL  ORGAN  OF  INDIANA  TAK- 
ING THE  RIGHT  GROUND  ON  THE  GREAT  QUESTION 
OF  THE  RETURN  OF  DESERTERS. 

The  following  article,  which  is  the  leading  editorial  of  the 
Indianapolis  Sentinel  of  March  21,  is  timely  and  important. 
We  recognize  it  as  a  favorable  indication,  and  publish  it  with 
great  satisfaction : — 

ARREST    OF   DESERTERS. 

We  regret  to  notice  that  the  arrest  of  deserters  by  the 
military  authorities  has  been  interfered  with  in  several  in- 
stances by  citizens  in  various  portions  of  the  State.  We  hope 
that  Democrats  will  not  lend  themselves  or  their  influence  to 
aid  soldiers  in  defeating  their  just  obligations  to  the  Govern- 
ment. Obedience  to  law  is  not  only  a  cardinal  principle  of 
the  Democratic  party,  but  it  is  the  best  evidence  and  test  of 
good  citizenship.  With  but  few  exceptions,  the  army  is  com- 
posed of  men  who  have  voluntarily  enlisted  in  that  depart- 
ment of  the  public  service,  and  with  a  full  knowledge  of  the 
responsibility  they  assumed  in  thus  contracting  their  services 
to  the  Government.  The  soldier  honestly  owes  that  service 
for  the  period  he  has  enlisted.  Desertion  is  also  a  mean  crime. 
There  is  scarcely  a  circumstance  which  will  make  it  defensible. 
If  desertion  is  encouraged,  and  deserters  harbored  and  pro- 
tected from  arrest  and  return  to  the  fulfillment  of  their  obliga- 
tions, the  discipline  of  the  army  cannot  be  maintained,  and  its 
demoralization  must  follow  as  a  necessary  and  certain  result. 

The  penalties  of  the  laws  and  regulations  against  desertion 
and  deserters,  and  those  who  harbor  and  aid  deserters,  are 
severe.  They  are  necessarily  so.  If  the  honor  of  the  service 
cannot  be  maintained,  and  those  who  have  contracted  their 
services  held  to  their  agreement,  it  will  be  useless  to  attempt 
the  organization  of  armies  to  protect  the  public  honor  and  the 
public  interests.  This  proposition  is  so  self-evident  that  it  is 
needless  to  illustrate  it.  If  there  is  any  just  reason  why  a 
soldier  should  be  released  from  his  contract  with  the  Govern- 
ment, he  should  seek  an  honorable  discharge,  which  should  be 
granted;  but  to  steal  away,  or  run  away  from  the  service,  is  a 
violation  of  good  honor  that  should  find  no  encouragement 
whatever;  but,  otherwise,  such  faithlessness  should  be  repu- 
diated and  rebuked  by  every  good  citizen.  Obedience  to  law 
is  the  only  security  to  person  and  the  rights  of  property,  and 
anarchy  must  follow  a  disregard  of  law  and  the  obligations  it 
enjoins. 


THE  CONSCBIPTION. 


ALSO 


SPEECHES 


HON.  W.  D.  KELLEY,  OF  PENNSYLVANIA, 


IN 


THE  HOUSE  OF  REPRESENTATIVES, 

ON 

THE  CONSCRIPTION ; 
THE  WAT  TO  ATTAIN  AND  SECURE  PEACE; 

AND    ON       ~> 

AKMING  THE  NEGBOES. 

• 

WITH    A 

• 

LETTER  FROM  SECRETARY  CHASE. 


PHILADELPHIA: 

PRINTED   FOR   GRATUITOUS   DISTRIBUTION. 
1863. 


THE  CONSCRIPTION. 


THIS  "Act  for  enrolling  and  calling  out  the  national  forces*' 
was  framed  to  be  more  efficient  for  war  purposes  than  were  the 
existing  militia  laws,  less  burdensome  upon  the  treasury  and 
the  people,  and  more  humane  to  the  poor,  who  have  the  aged, 
and  infirm,  and  helpless  dependent  upon  their  labor  for  sup- 
port. These  objects,  sanctioned  by  patriotism,  economy,  jus- 
tice, and  humanity,  have  been  attained  as  nearly  as  the  un- 
equal lot  of  mankind  will  permit.  This  law,  enthusiastically 
welcomed  by  the  armies  of  the  Republic,  referred  to  by  other 
nations  as  the  highest  evidence  of  the  determined  purposes  of 
the  United  States  Government,  dreaded  by  armed  traitots, 
and  denounced  by  rebel  sympathizers  at  the  North,  bears  in 
every  section  and  in  every  line  evidence  of  the  patriotism, 
justice,  and  humanity  of  Congress. 

Contrast  the  provisions  of  this  denounced  act  with  the  pro- 
visions of  the  existing  militia  laws  of  the  United  States,  and 
of  the  militia  laws  of  the  several  States.  By  the  existing 
militia  laws  of  the  United  States,  the  President  is  authorized 
to  call  into  the  service  of  the  National  Government  the  militia 
of  the  several  States.  By  these  laws,  and  by  the  laws  of  the 
States,  certain  classes  of  persons  are  excepted  and  exempted 
from  military  duty — from  being  drafted  into  the  service  of  the 
United  States.  These  exempts  are  not  the  poor,  who  have 
widowed  mothers,  aged  and  infirm  parents,  motherless  infant 
children,  or  fatherless  and  motherless  young  brothers  and 
sisters  dependent  on  their  labor  for  support.  No,  not  these ! 
Neither  the  national  laws  nor  the  laws  of  any  State  in  the 
Union  exempt  the  poor,  who  have  the  aged,  the  infirm,  the 

(3) 


helpless  dependent  upon  them.  At  the  call  of  the  Government 
under  these  laws,  they  must  leave  widowed  mothers,  aged  and 
infirm  parents,  fatherless  and  motherless  sisters  and  brothers, 
and  motherless  infant  children  who  are  dependent  on  their 
daily  toil  for  support,  and  be  hastened  away  to  the  camp  and 
the  battle-field. 

Who,  then,  are  exempted  by  the  existing  militia  laws  of  the 
United  States,  and  of  the  several  States  of  the  Union?  Not 
the  poor,  the  dependent  sons  of  toil,  but  the  most  fortunate 
and  favored  of  the  people — members  of  Congress,  custom- 
house officers  and  clerks,  postmasters  and  clerks,  (a  host  in 
themselves,  whose  support  comes  out  of  the  money  of  the 
nation,)  professors  and  students  in  colleges,  and  ministers  of 
the  gospel,  judicial  officers  and  other  officials,  Quakers, 
Shakers,  and  persons  who  may  profess  conscientious  scruples 
against  bearing  arms,  members  of  engine  companies,  hook  and 
ladder  companies,  or  persons  otherwise  connected  with  the  fire 
department.  The  Conscription  Act,  on  the  other  hand,  ex- 
empts, in  addition  to  such  as  are  physically  or  mentally  unfit 
for  military  duty — First,  the  Vice-President  of  the  United 
States,  the  Judges  of  the  United  States  Courts,  the'  heads 
only  of  the  executive  departments  of  the  National  Govern- 
ment, and  the  Governors  of  the  several  States. 

Second.  THE  ONLY  SON  LIABLE  TO  MILITARY  DUTY  OF  A 

WIDOW  DEPENDENT  ON  HIS  LABOR  FOR  SUPPORT. 

Third.  THE  ONLY  SON  OF  AGED  OR  INFIRM  PARENTS,  OR 

PARENTS  DEPENDENT  ON  HIS  LABOR  FOR  SUPPORT. 

Fourth.  WHERE  THERE  ARE  TWO  OR  MORE  SONS  OF  AGED 

OR  INFIRM  PARENTS  SUBJECT  TO  DRAFT,  THE  FATHER,  OR  IF 
HE  BE  DEAD,  THE  MOTHER,  MAY  ELECT  WHICH  SON  SHALL  BE 
EXEMPT. 

Fifth.  THE  ONLY  BROTHER  OF  CHILDREN  NOT  TWELVE  YEARS 
OLD,  HAVING  NEITHER  FATHER  NOR  MOTHER,  AND  DEPENDENT 
UPON  HIS  LABOR"  FOR  SUPPORT. 

Sixth.   THE  FATHER   OF  MOTHERLESS    CHILDREN  UNDER 

TWELVE  YEARS  OF  AGE,  WHO  ARE  DEPENDENT  UPON  HIS  LABOR 
FOR  SUPPORT. 


Seventh.  WHERE  THERE  ARE  A  FATHER  AND  SONS  IN  THE 

SAME  FAMILY  AND  HOUSEHOLD,  AND  TWO  OF  THEM  ARE  IN  THE 
MILITARY  SERVICE  OF  THE  UNITED  STATES  AS  NON-COMMIS- 
SIONED OFFICERS,  MUSICIANS,  OR  PRIVATES,  THE  RESIDUE  OF 
SUCH  FAMILY  OR  HOUSEHOLD,  NOT  EXCEEDING  TWO,  SHALL  BE 
EXEMPT. 

Eighth.  Young  men  between  the  ages  of  eighteen  and  twenty 
are  exempt,  for  the  reason  that  experience  proves  that  soldiers 
under  twenty  years  of  age  cannot  sustain  the  burdens  of  camp 
life  as  well  as  men  between  the  ages  of  twenty  and  thirty- 
five. 

These  exemptions  of  the  Conscription  Act  (so  called)  are  in 
favor  of  those  upon  whose  daily  toil  the  aged,  infirm,  and  help- 
less rely.  Is  it,  as  has  been  charged  upon  it,  making  "in- 
famous distinctions  between  the  rich  and  the  poor,"  to  EXEMPT 
THE  ONLY  SONS  OF  POOR  WIDOWS,  and  to  compel  members  of 
Congress  to  fight,  procure  substitutes,  or  pay  for  substitutes? 

to  EXEMPT  THE  ONLY  SONS  OF  AGED  OR  INFIRM  PARENTS  DE- 
PENDENT ON  THEM  FOR  BREAD,  and  compel  the  whole  army  of 
custom-house  officers,  postmasters,  and  Government  clerks  to 
fight,  procure,  or  pay  for  substitutes  ?  to  EXEMPT  THE  ONLY 

BROTHERS  OF  FATHERLESS  AND  MOTHERLESS  LITTLE  BROTHERS 
AND  SISTERS  DEPENDENT  UPON  THEIR  DAILY  TOIL  FOR  SUP- 
PORT? to  EXEMPT  THE  FATHERS  OF  MOTHERLESS  INFANT  CHIL- 
DREN DEPENDENT  UPON  THESE  FATHERS'  DAILY  TOIL  FOR  SUS- 
TENANCE, and  compel  State  judges,  justices 'of  the  peace, 
clergymen,  and  college  professors  to  fight,  procure  substitutes, 
or  pay  for  substitutes?  Shame  on  the  men  who  misrepresent 
the  beneficient  provisions  of  an  act  passed  to  uphold  the  cause 
of  our  imperiled  country  ! 

The  13th  section  of  the  act  in  question  provides  that  any 
person  drafted  and  notified  to  appear  at  the  rendezvous,  may, 
on  or  before  the  day  fixed  for  his  appearance,  furnish  an  ac- 
ceptable substitute  to  take  his  place  in  the  draft ;  or  he  may 
pay  to  such  person  as  the  Secretary  of  War  may  authorize  to 
receive  it,  such  sum,  not  exceeding  $300,  as  the  Secretary 
may  determine,  for  the  procuration  of  such  substitute,  which 


6 

sum  shall  be  fixed  at  a  uniform  rate  by  a  general  order  made 
at  the  time  of  ordering  a  draft  for  any  State  or  Territory. 
Any  person  may  furnish  an  acceptable  substitute  to  take  his 
place  in  the  draft  at  any  price  for  which  he  can  procure  one. 
Every  drafted  man  is  at  liberty  to  furnish  a  substitute  at  such 
rate  as  he  may  agree  to  pay  the  substitute;  or  any  drafted 
man  may  pay  such  sum,  not  exceeding  $300,  as  the  Secretary 
of  War  may  determine,  to  procure  a  substitute. 

The  sum  to  be  fixed  by  the  Secretary  is  not  to  exceed 
$300.  It  may  be  less,  it  cannot  be  more.  This  provision 
was  put  into  the  law  for  the  sole  and  single  purpose  of  KEEP- 
ING DOWN  THE  PRICE  or  SUBSTITUTES,  so  that  men  of  very 
moderate  means,  and  poor  men,  could  more  readily  obtain 
substitutes.  It  enables  the  Secretary  to  fix  the  sum  which 
will  be  the  price  of  substitutes.  Without  this  provision,  it 
was  believed  that  the  price  for  substitutes  would  go  up  at 
once  to  $1000  or  $2000,  so  that  none  but  rich  men  could  ob- 
tain them.  If  any  drafted  man  can  obtain  a  substitute  for  a 
sum  less  than  that  fixed  by  the  Secretary,  he  is  at  liberty  to 
do  so.  This  authority  conferred  upon  the  Secretary  to  fix 
any  sum  less  than  $300  was  purposely  given  to  check  specu- 
lations, to  keep  down  the  price  of  substitutes,  and  it  must  in- 
evitably do  so. 

Partisan  malignity,  in  its  blindness  and  madness,  would  per- 
vert a  measure  framed  to  protect  the  very  interests  of  those 
who  most  need  protection  into  a  distinction  in  favor  of  the 
rich  and  against  the  poor. 

THIS  ACT  FOR  ENROLLING  AND  CALLING  OUT  THE  NATIONAL 
FORCES  GIVES  ASSURANCE  TO  THE  WORLD  THAT  IT  IS  THE  UN- 
ALTERABLE PURPOSE  OF  THE  NATION  TO  CRUSH  OUT  THIS 

WICKED  REBELLION.  Denunciations  of  its  provisions  can  only 
fire  the  heart  and  nerve  the  arms  of  traitors,  thus  putting  in 
peril  the  holy  cause  of  our  country,  and  the  precious  blood  of 
its  heroic  defenders ;  and  by  reviving  the  waning  hopes  of  the 
rebellion,  will  render  more  absolutely  necessary  the  putting 
into  execution  the  draft  provided  by  the  act.  The  only  way 
in  which  it  can  be  averted  is  by  promptly  arming  the  willing 


hands  of  loyal  men  in  the  rebel  States,  and  by  immediately 
yielding  a  united  and  enthusiastic  support  to  the  Government, 
thus  speedily  and  thoroughly  crushing  the  hopes,  and  effect- 
ually baffling  the  efforts  of  the  rebels. 


REMARKS  OF  HON.  WM.  D.  KELLEY,  OP  PENNSYLVA- 
NIA, IN  REPLY  TO  THE  OPPONENTS  OF  THE  CON- 
SCRIPTION BILL. 

Delivered  in  the  House  of  Representatives,  February  24, 1863. 

Mr.  Speaker,  the  discussidfe  upon  this  most  important  bill 
draws  to  a  close.  The  discussion  has,  it  seems  to  me,  been 
made  the  occasion  for  proving,  not  the  dangerous  powers  of 
the  bill,  but  the  necessity  for  some  such  provisions  as  it  em- 
bodies, whereby  every  species  of  "treasonable  practice"  may 
be  quickly  suppressed. 

The  gentleman  from  Kentucky  (Mr.  MALLORY)  inquired  this 
morning  when  or  in  which  of  our  wars  such  powers  had  been 
asked  for.  When  I  ask,  in  return,  was  the  exercise  of  such 
powers  necessary  before?  Sir,  there  was  little  occasion  for 
their  enactment  during  our  earlier  wars.  When  a  few  inftuen- 
tial  men  of  Pennsylvania  during  the  revolutionary  war  talked 
as  gentlemen  have  talked  on  this  floor,  the  executive  councils 
sent  them  far  inland  into  the  then  remote  State  of  Virginia. 
They  were  seized,  by  night  or  by  day,  wherever  they  could  be 
found,  and  forthwith  hastened  upon  their  journey  thither,  and 
the  right  to  the  writ  of  habeas  corpus  expressly  denied  them. 
That  transaction  was  approved  by  George  Washington,  and 
the  Continental  Congress  passed  a  bill  of  indemnity,  covering 
all  parties  concerned  in  it.  There  were  it  is  true  cow-boys  in 
those  days  in  the  South,  and  as  this  instance  shows,  a  few  false 
and  craven  creatures  in  the  North  who  sympathized  with  the 
enemy  and  prayed  "for  peace  on  any  terms,"  but  they  were 
so  few  that  they  dared  not  hope  to  be  able  to  debauch  the 
sentiment  of  the  army,  so  few  as  not  to  hope,  as  is  now  hoped 
by  the  disloyal  managers  of  the  opposition,  to  be  able  to  para- 
lyze the  arm  of  the  Government. 

During  the  late  war,  the  men  who  attempted  to  embarrass 
the  Administration  charged  with  its  conduct,  were  overwhelmed 


8 

by  public  indignation,  and  the  few  who  attempted  to  interfere 
with  the  morale  of  the  army  were  given  a  summary  trial  under 
a  drum-head  court-martial,  and  executed  by  order  of  Andrew 
Jackson.  This  action  called  forth  the  famous  Coffin  hand-bill, 
the  enduring  infamy  of  the  author  of  which  some  gentlemen  on 
the  other  side  appear  to  emulate.  Sir,  the  right  of  self-defense 
inheres  in  every  man  and  in  every  government,  and  the  bill 
under  discussion  provides  surely  and  wisely  for  the  main- 
tenance and  defense  of  the  Government  of  the  United  States 
against  traitorous  sons  in  the  South  and  sympathizers  with 
traitors  in  the  North — men  working  in  a  common  spirit  to  a 
common  end:  those  with  force  upon  the  battle-field;  these  with 
subtle  poison  that  reaches  the  mind  and  heart, — with  the  per- 
verted or  invented  fact  and  false  conclusion  that  may  seduce 
frona  his  true  fealty  the  ignorartl  but  enthusiastic  citizen  and 
patriot. 

The  gentleman,  in  flagrant  disregard  of  the  rule  of  the 
House,  said  that  no  man,  no  single  member,  was  willing  at  the 
beginning  of  this  Congress  to  stand  where  THADDEUS  STE- 
VENS, ELLIOT,  and  LOVEJOY  now  stand.  It  was  on  the  7th  of 
January,  1862,  that  from  this  seat  I  prayed  that  our  Admin- 
istration might  be  taught  speedily  to  avail  itself  not  only  of 
the  resources  of  the  North,  but  those  of  the  enemy,  that  it 
would  strike  them  in  the  tender  point,  that  it  would  throw 
them  upon  their  own  resources  for  a  supply  of  food  and  cloth- 
ing, as  it  was  its  duty  to  do,  by  proclaiming  protection  to  every 
loyal  man  and  woman  that  should  come  to  the  standard  of  the 
country.  My  language,  as  I  find  it  in  the  Globe,  was: — ".And 
I  pray  God  that  it  (the  Administration)  may  so  far  read  the 
laws  of  war  as  to  learn  that  it  is  the  duty  of  Congress,  the 
generals  at  the  head  of  the  several  columns  of  the  army,  and 
the  Government  of  the  United  States,  to  cut  off  all  the  re- 
sources of  the  rebels  now  in  arms  against  us.  It  is  the  first 
and  last  law  in  war.  Its  thorough  enforcement  is  called  for 
by  all  the  promptings  of  patriotism  and  humanity,  and  promises 
internal  and  external  peace  to  our  distracted  country.". 

I  have  always  stood  where  those  gentlemen  stand  on  the 
question  so  inopportunely  discussed  by  the  gentleman  from 
Kentucky,  (Mr.  MALLORY.)  But,  for  his  own  purposes,  he 
would  teach  the  people  of  the  South,  and  especially  of  the 
Border  States,  that  the  objects  of  this  war  have  been  perverted, 
that  it  is  no  longer  waged  for  constitutional  ends  or  by  legal 
means.  He  says  truly  that  the  sense  of  this  House  was  ex- 


9 

x  pressed  in  the  resolution  of  his  venerable  and  distinguished 
colleague,  (Mr.  CRITTENDEN,)  and  adds,  that  the  spirit  of  that 
resolution  has  been  abandoned.  Sir,  while  it  was  hoped  and 
believed  that  there  was  some  lurking  patriotism  among  the 
controlling  minds  of  the  South,  and  that  they  might  be  in- 
fluenced by  a  conciliatory  spirit,  we  were  all  willing  to  accept 
peace  and  a  restoration  of  the  Union  as  things  then  were; 
yes,  waiving  our  right  to  take  advantage  of  the  great  wrong 
that  had  been  committed,  and  overturn  the  institution  that 
instigated  it,  we  said  to  them,  "  Come  back,  and  all  the  past, 
even  to  this  moment,  shall  be  forgotten."  How  delusive  was 
our  hope!  What  was  then  is  not  now.  Since  then  200,000 
of  our  brave  countrymen  sleep  their  last  sleep  in  Southern  soil, 
and  over  the  graves  of  these  murdered  Americans  I  never  will 
shake  hands  and  bow  and  beg  pardon  of  their  murderers;  nor 
will  the  American  people.  We  cannot  have  indemnity  for  the 
past,  but  we  demand  and  will  have  security  for  the  future. 

I  am  for  exercising  all  the  rights  and  powers  of  the  Govern- 
ment in  this  behalf.  I  am,  as  I  believe  the  majority  of  the 
House  is,  for  eradicating,  wherever  it  may  constitutionally  do 
it,  that  poison,  that  subtle  poison  that  engendered  this  rebellion, 
which  made  those  graves.  The  gentleman  says  that  the  friends 
of  the  Administration  no  longer  march  to  the  music  of  the 
Union,  that  they  dance  to  the  music  of  Greeley,  Lovejoy,  and 
Stevens.  Said  he,  "the  gentleman  from  Pennsylvania,  the 
Chairman  of  the  Committee  of  Ways  and  Means,  had  educated 
them  up  to  his  measure."  He  did  my  distinguished  colleague 
honor  overmuch.  The  events  of  this  era  are  under  the  manage- 
ment of  no  man  or  set  of  men.  It  is  to  the  music  of  the  spheres 
that  the  patriot  army  and  the  country  march.  Providence  is 
the  guide.  He  alone  controls  the  march  of  events;  and  the 
music  to  which  the  country  moves  is  the  spheral  strains  which 
inspire  undying  faith  and  dauntless  courage  in  the  cause  of 
justice  and  mercy,  and  that  peace  which,  resting  on  these  foun- 
dationsj  shall  endure  forever.  Sir,  the  music  to  which  we  march 
inspires  us  by  recalling  the  highest  glories  of  the  past ;  its 
seraphic  strains  breathe  forth  the  hopes  and  joys  of  the  bright 
and  illimitable  future  which  is  to  follow  this  night  of  strife 
and  woe. 

Not  my  colleague,  but  God  has  been  our  instructor.  He  has 
brought  us  forward,  step  by  step,  until  at  last  we  are  about  to 
enact  a  law  in  which  we  recognize  man  as  man.  Nor  is  the 
bill  demanded  by  the  philanthropist  alone.  Eighteen  months 


10 

of  providential  teachings  have  so  far  educated  us  that  the  most 
stupid  have  learned  that  four  millions  of  people  on  our  side 
are  better  for  us  than  the  same  four  millions  warring  or  work- 
ing against  us. 

The  bill  before  us  is  to  stand  as  law  for  three  years.  It  is 
consistent  with  legislation  already  on  the  statute  book  author- 
izing the  President  to  arm  and  equip  all  able-bodied  men,  irre- 
spective of  color,  that  may  be  needed  for  the  suppression  of 
this  rebellion,  and  it  must  not  be  emasculated  by  adopting  the 
amendment  of  the  gentleman  from  Ohio,  [Mr.  Cox,]  and  in- 
serting the  word  "white"  before  men.  Let  it  stand  as  it  is, 
and  it  will  give  us  all  the  soldiers  we  need. 

Mr.  Speaker,  let  me  repeat,  that  it  is  God  who  is  teaching 
this  people  and  their  representatives  by  his  mysterious  provi- 
dence. Why,  the  question  is  asked,  could  not  this  country 
have  progressed  peacefully  as  it  was  progressing?  Why  must 
this  war  come?  Sir,  I  know  not  why,  but,  in  the  bitterness 
of  a  heart,  stricken  at  many  points  by  the  loss  of  friends  and 
kindred,  and  the  greater  sorrows  of  others,  as  it  is  upon  us, 
I  hail  it  as  the  era  of  a  new  and  higher  birth  for  man  and  for 
society.  I  know  not  why  it  is  that  all  great  blessings  come 
to  us  through  pain  and  sorrow.  It  is  to  the  agonies  of  the 
Garden  and  the  Cross  that  we  owe  our  sublime  faith  and  im- 
mortal hopes.  Who  can  tell  the  anguish  arid  pain  that  are 
compensated  by  the  first  cherub  smile  that  plays  upon  the 
cradled  infant's  cheek  ?  And  why  is  it  that  through  the  pains 
and  lingering  torments  of  the  sick-room  or  the  horrors  of  the 
battle-field  that  we  pass  from  cares  and  sorrow  to  the  better 
and  happier  world  ?  I  cannot  explain  God's  providence,  but 
I  do  note  its  visible  fruits,  and  am  taught  to  behold  in  the 
agony  of  my  country  the  sure  presage  of  a  new  and  higher 
life  for  her. 

"Pass,  this  bill,"  exclaims  the  gentleman,  "press  onward, 
press  onward,  and  I  will  invoke  revolution."  No,  sir,  let  me 
not  do  him  injustice;  he  said,  "I  will  hail  revolution."  What 
does  he  mean?  Does  he  mean  to  say,  from  his  desk  in  this 
House,  that  if  we  dare  to  pass  this  bill  he  and  his  friends  will 
resist  it  by  force  ?  If  that  be  his  meaning,  I  tell  him  that  the 
sons  of  Pennsylvania  who  marched  to  protect  his  home,  and 
the  homes  of  other  Kentuckians,  and  who  now  sleep  there  in 
green  mounds,  have  not  died  hi  vain,  and  that  their  graves  are 
sacred  shrines,  dear  to  the  heart  of  the  people  of  Pennsylvania, 
which  they  never  will  consent  to  visit  in  a  foreign  land.  Let 


11 

his  hail  inaugurate  a  new  attempt  at  revolution,  and  the  North- 
ern army  that  has  protected  him  and  his  will  clear  the  earth 
of  him  and  them.  I  deal  not  in  threats,  but  in  this  hour  of 
our  country's  peril  it  is  not  for  us  to  be  too  nicely  careful  of  our 
language,  when  we  hear  from  the  other  side  the  cry  of  "peace 
on  any  terms,"  and  are  told  what  the  people  of  this  or  that 
State  will  not  stand,  and  finally,  that  if  we  do  not  yield  to  a 
despotic  minority,  they  will  hail  revolution. 

The  gentleman  from  New  York,  [Mr.  STEELS,]  in  the  midst 
of  patriotic  protestations,  echoes  the  strain,  saying  we  do  not 
want  an  abolition  war,  we  have  supplied  all  the  men  we  have 
been  asked  for.  Who  does  want  an  abolition  war,  or  wherein 
does  this  bill  propose  to  make  one  ? 

The  gentleman  says  that  he  and  his  friends  do  not  like  the 
way  "the  machine  is  being  run."  I  suppose  not.  Men  who 
denounce  every  measure  by  which  it  is  proposed  to  save  the 
Republic  are  not  likely  to  approve  the  manner  in  which  the 
machine  has  been  run  lately. 

The  Richmond  Enquirer  agrees  with  the  gentleman  and 
those  with  whom  he  labors  in  the  endeavor  to  poison  the  popu- 
lar mind,  that  "the  machine  is  running  in  the  wrong  direc- 
tion." Let  it  speak  for  itself.  The  coincidence  of  opinion 
b'etween  the  gentleman  and  it  is  the  more  remarkable,  as  he  is 
a  prime  patriot  and  its  editor  is  a  first-class  traitor. 

I  read  from  the  Richmond  Enquirer  of  the  10th  inst. : — 

"THIKD  STAGE  OF  THE  WAR. 

"  We  have  fairly  entered  upon  the  third  stage  indicated  by  the  Presi- 
dent in  his  message,  namely,  that  of  a  war  for  subjugation  and  extermina- 
tion. The  people  of  this  Confederacy,  isolated  and  shut  up  from  all  the 
world,  have  now  to  encounter  the  most  horrible  and  demoniac  effort  for 
the  assassination  of  a  whole  race  that  history  has  yet  recorded,  or  we 
believe  will  ever  have  to  record  till  history  grows  gray.  For  it  is  not 
every  century,  it  is  not  every  ceon,  that  shows  the  world  a  Yankee  nation. 
Yes,  the  Confederate  people  have  now  at  last  to  strip  for  battle — it  is  a 
people  that  must  this  time  very  literally  conquer  or  die. 

"No  doubt  it  would  be  agreeable  to  believe  that  this  last  stage  of  the 
war  will  soon  be  over,  and  must  end  in  the  speedy  destruction  of  our 
intended  murderers.  But  look  round  the  map  of  the  Confederacy,  and 
judge  if  we  can  soothe  ourselves  with  this  belief.  In  the  very  heart  of 
the  country  our  gallant  sentinel  of  the  Mississippi — heroic  little  Vicks- 
burg — has  sustained,  indeed,  and  baffled  two  tremendous  sieges ;  but  a 
third  time  her  citizens  see  pouring  in  around  them  from  the  North  and 
the  West  enormous  masses  of  the  beleaguering  foe ;  iron  floating  batteries 
again  crowd  down  upon  her;  and,  even  as  you  read  these  words,  two 
hundred  heavy  guns  may  be  thundering  upon  her  defenses,  a  hundred 
thousand  men  may  be  pressing  to  the  storm  of  her  ramparts.  Again 


12 

she  will  drive  them  off,  perhaps,  and  remain  the  famous  maiden  city  of 
this  hemisphere,  the  bulwark  of  the  West ;  so  be  it !  But  the  vision  we 
see  on  the  Mississippi  does  not  look  very  like  exhaustion  or  despair  on 
the  part  of  the  foe  just  yet. 

"And  again,  look  to  the  mouth  of  the  mighty  river.  New  Orleans  is 
not  a  maiden  city;  alas!  the  base  rag  that  has  so  often  been  rent  and 
trampled  before  Richmond  and  before  Vicksburg  flies  from  all  the  towers 
of  that  deflowered  city.  Hordes  of  hungry  Yankees,  armed  to  the  teeth, 
sit  in  the  shade  of  her  orange  groves,  and  station  negro  guards  over  the 
mansions  of  her  noblest  citizens.  All  her.  best  and  fairest  have  to  lament 
every  day  that  their  goodly  city  had  not  been  laid  in  ashes  before  it 
became  a  haunt  of  obscene  creatures.  No  sign  of  relaxation '  there ! 
And,  but  a  short  way  off,  Mobile,  by  the  shores  of  her  spacious  bay, 
keeps  diligent  watch  and  ward,  expecting,  in  the  light  of  each  morning 
sun,  to  see  the  thrice  accursed  stars  and  stripes  gleaming  through  the 
smoke  of  a  bombarding  squadron.  All  along  the  Gulf,  and  around  the 
coast  of  Florida,  this  omnipresent  enemy,  who  is  said  to  have  just  been 
playing  his  last  card,  is  shutting  up  every  river  and  planting  his  guns  on 
every  strong  place.  Savannah,  shut  in  from  the  sea  by  Fort  Pulaski,  in 
the  hands  of  the  same  inveterate  Yankee,  listens  for  the  first  boom  of  the 
artillery  that  is  to  level  her  walls  with  her  sandy  soil;  and  Charleston, 
grimly  calm,  but  with  beating  heart,  stands  waiting  the  onset  of  the 
great  armada. 

"  Those  few  acres  of  old  Oyster  Point,  it  seems,  already  swept  and 
devastated  by  conflagrations,  are  to' be  the  object  and  the  prize  of  the 
most  potent  armament  by  far  that  American  waters  have  ever  seen. 
This  very  moment,  it  may  be,  the  black  Monitor  batteries  are  steaming 
between  Sumter  and  Moultrie.  No  signs  of  relaxation,  of  discourage- 
ment and  despair  in  the  enemy  here !  Pass  further,  and  you  will  find 
the  whole  coast  from  Charleston  to  Norfolk,  and  every  river  to  the  head 
of  tide-water,  and  every  creek  and  sound  formed  by  the  sea  islands, 
swarming  with  their  gunboats  and  transports,  ready  to  pour  in  masses 
of  troops  wherever  there  is  a  chance  of  plunder,  bridge  burning,  and 
general  havoc. 

"From  Norfolk  all  around  by  Chesapeake  and  Potomac,  we  are  guarded 
by  gunboats,  and  no  living  thing  (save  skulking  smugglers)  suffered  to 
enter  or  go  out.  On  the  Rappahannock  two  hundred  thousand  men  wait 
for  a  drying  wind  to  move  'on  to  Richmond'  once  more,  led  by  a  genuine 
apostle  of  extermination.  At  last  the  savage  Abolitionists  of  Massa- 
chusetts have  the  right  man  in  the  right  place.  Heretofore  they  have 
rather  wished  the  defeat  pf  Lincoln's  generals  on  the  Potomac,  because 
they  seemed  to  be  soldiers  and  not  thieves  or  assassins;  but  with  Hooker 
they  feel  at  home;  under  Hooker  they  count  upon  owning  Southern 
plantations  and  giving  law  to  Southern  vassals.  To  possess  himself  of 
the  property  of  others,  a  genuine  Yankee  will,  perhaps,  even  fight. 

"And  Northwestern  Virginia  is  desolated  by  Milroy  and  his  men;  and 
Kentucky  and  the  half  of  Tennessee,  the  richest  and  fairest  lands  of  all 
the  West,  are  entirely  in  the  clutch  of  the  enemy,  while  the  rivers  bring 
them  up  fleets  of  transports ;  and  Rosecrans,  with  another  large  army, 
threatens  to  sweep  all  opposition  from  his  path  and  join  the  other  brigands 
who  are  crowding  upon  Vicksburg. 

"Where,  in  all  this  wide  circuit,  does  the  invasion  seem  to  be  fainting 
or  giving  ground  ?  All  round  the  border,  and  in  the  very  heart  of  the 


13 

* 

Confederacy,  the  foot  of  the  enemy  is  planted  and  his  felon  flag  flies ; 
and  it  means  subjugation  and  extermination.  It  is,  indeed,  the  third 
stage  of  the  war,  and  we  believe  the  last;  but  the  struggle  will  be  des- 
perate. If  it  be  the  '  last  card,'  it  is  one  on  which  the  stake  is  life  or 
death,  honor  or  shame — either  our  name  and  nation  will  be  extinguished 
in  a  night  of  blood  and  horror,  or  else  a  new  sovereignty,  the  newest, 
fairest,  proudest,  will  take  her  seat  among  the  powers  of  the  earth,  with 
the  applause  of  man  and  the  blessings  of  Heaven." 

I  do  not  wonder  that  those  who  find  in  the  Internal  Revenue 
Bill  a  mere  means  of  extending  the  corrupt  patronage  of  the 
Government,  and  in  the  Bank  Bill  and  the  bill  now  before 
the  House  only  the  unconstitutional  agencies  of  unconstitu- 
tional and  despotic  power,  should,  in  view  of  the  Richmond 
Enquirer's  complaints,  feel  that  the  machinery  of  the  Govern- 
ment is  running  a  little  wrong. 

But  let  me  briefly  turn  to  the  gentleman  from  Ohio,  [Mr. 
Cox.] 

In  the  course  of  the  tirade  against  the  Administration  and 
its  policy,  misrepresenting  both,  he  indulged  his  sportive  mood 
by  quoting  an  alleged  private  letter  of  the  dead  Douglas.  Oh, 
that  Douglas  lived  to-day,  how  would  he  rebuke  men  who  make 
such  speeches  and  gloss  them  over  with  his  name !  He  says 
there  was  a  letter  from  Senator  Douglas  showing  that  a  com- 
promise would  have  been  made  had  it  not  been  essential  to  the 
Republicans  to  drive  certain  gentlemen  from  the  Senate,  in  order 
to  secure  the  confirmation  of  certain  men  whom  the  President 
desired  to  nominate  to  high  offices,  such  as  Schurtz,  Clay,  etc. 
Senator  Douglas  was  a  truthful  man.  Let  me  answer  the 
gentleman  from  the  columns  of  the  Globe,  and  let  the  Demo- 
cratic Senator  from  California,  [Mr.  LATHAM,]  and  the  fit 
successor  of  the  sage  and  hero  of  the  Hermitage,  vindicate 
history  and  the  buried  Senator  from  their  foul  aspersion. 

The  speech  of  this  grand  old  "pro-consul,"  as  some  gentle- 
men on  the  other  side  delight  in  calling  military  governors 
and  successful  generals,  will  be  found  in  the  46th  volume  of 
the  Globe.  I  quote  from  page  487.  Senator  Johnson  said: — 

"The  Senator  told  us  that  the  adoption  of  the  Clark  amendment  to 
the  Crittenden  resolutions  defeated  the  settlement  of  the  questions  of 
controversy ;  and  that,  but  for  that  vote,  all  could  have  been  peace  and 
prosperity  now.  We  were  told  that  the  Clark  amendment  defeated  the 
Crittenden  compromise,  and  prevented  a  settlement  of  the  controversy. 
On  this  point  I  will  read  a  portion  of  the  speech  of  my  worthy  and 
talented  friend  from  California,  [Mr.  LATHAM;]  and  when  I  speak  of 
him  thus,  I  do  it  in  no  unmeaning  sense.  I  intend  that  he,  not  I,  shall 
answer  the  Senator  from  Delaware.  I  know  that  sometimes,  when  gen- 


14 

I 

tlemen  are  fixing  up  their  pretty  rhetorical  flourishes,  they  do  not  take 
time  to  see  all  the  sharp  corners  they  may  encounter.  If  they  can  make 
a  readable  sentence,  and  float  on  in  a  smooth,  easy  stream,  all  goes  well, 
and  they  are  satisfied.  As  I  have  said,  the  Senator  from  Delaware  told 
us  that  the  Clark  amendment  was  the  turning-point  in  the  whole  matter ; 
that  from  it  had  flowed  rebellion,  revolution,  war,  the  shooting  and  im- 
prisonment of  people  in  different  States — perhaps  he  meant  to  include 
my  own.  This  was  the  Pandora's  box  that  has  been  opened,  out  of 
which  all  the  evils  that  now  afflict  the  land  have  flown.  Thank  God,  I 
still-have  hope  that  all  will  yet  be  saved.  My  worthy  friend  from  Cali- 
fornia, [Mr.  LATHAM,]  during  the  last  session  of  Congress,  made  one  of 
the  best  speeches  he  ever  made.  I  bought  five  thousand  copies  of  it  for 
distribution,  but  I  had  no  constituents  to  send  them  to,  [laughter ;]  and 
they  have  been  lying  in  your  document-room  ever  since,  with  the  excep- 
tion of  a  few,  which  I  thought  would  do  good  in  some  quarters.  In  the 
course  of  that  speech  upon  this  very  point,  he  made  use  of  these  re- 
marks : — 

" '  Mr.  President,  being  last  winter  a  careful  eye-witness  of  all  that 
occurred,  I  soon  became  satisfied  that  it  was  a  deliberate,  willful  design, 
on  the  part  of  some  representatives  of  Southern  States,  to  seize  upon  the 
election  of  Mr.  Lincoln  merely  as  an  excuse  to  precipitate  this  revolu- 
tion upon  the  country.  One  evidence,  to  my  mind,  is  the  fact  that  South 
Carolina  never  sent  her  Senators  here.' 

"  Then  they  certainly  were  riot  influenced  by  the  Clark  amendment. 

" '  An  additional  evidence  is,  that  when  gentlemen  on  this  floor,  by 
their  votes,  could  have  controlled  legislation,  they  refused  to  cast  them 
for  fear  that  the  very  propositions  submitted  to  this  body  might  have  an 
influence  in  changing  the  opinions  of  their  constituencies.  Why,  sir, 
when  the  resolutions  submitted  by  the  Senator  from  New  Hampshire 
[Mr.  Clark]  were  offered  as  an  amendment  to  the  Crittenden  proposi- 
tions, for  the  manifest  purpose  of  embarrassing  the  latter,  and  the  vote 
taken  on  the  16th  of  January,  1861, 1  ask,  what  did  we  see  ?  There  were 
fifty-five  Senators  at  that  time  upon  this  floor  in  person.  The  Globe  of 
the  Second  Session,  Thirty-sixth  Congress,  part  1,  page  409,  shows  that 
upon  the  call  of  the  yeas  and  nays  immediately  preceding  the  vote  on  the 
substituting  of  Mr.  Clark's  amendment,  there  were  fifty-five  votes  cast. 
I  will  read  the  vote  from  the  Globe : — 

*"YEAS — Messrs.  Anthony,  Baker,  Bingham,  Cameron,  Chandler, 
Clark,  Collamer,  Dixon,  Doolittle,  Durkee,  Fessenden,  Foot,  Foster, 
Grimes,  Hale,  Harlan,  King,  Seward,  Simmons,  Sumner,  Ten  Eyck, 
Trumbull,  Wade,  Wilkinson,  and  Wilson— 25. 

"  *NAYS — Messrs.  Bayard,  Benjamin,  Bigler,  Bragg,  Bright,  Clingman, 
Crittenden,  Douglas,  Fitch,  Green,  Gwin,  Hemphill,  Hunter,  Iverson, 
Johnson,  of  Arkansas,  Johnson,  of  Tennessee,  Kennedy,  Lane,  Latham, 
Mason,  Nicholson,  Pearce,  Polk,  Powell,  Pugh,  Bice,  Saulsbury,  Sebas- 
tian, Slidell,  and  Wigfall— 30. 

"'The  vote  being  taken  immediately  after  on  the  Clark  proposition 
was  as  follows : — 

"•YEAS — Messrs.  Anthony,  Baker,  Bingham,  Cameron,  Chandler, 
Clark,  Collamer,  Dixon,  Doolittle,  Durkee,  Fessenden,  Foot,  Foster, 
Grimes,  Hale,  Harlan,  King,  Sewatd,  Simmons,  Sumner,  Ten  Eyck, 
Trumbull,  Wade,  Wilkinson,  and  Wilson— 25. 

"'NAYS — Messrs.  Bayard,  Bigler,  Bragg,  Bright,  Clingman,  Critten- 


15 

den,  Fitch,  Green,  Gwin,  Hunter,  Johnson,  of  Tennessee,  Kennedy,  Lane. 
Latham,  Mason,  Nicholson,  Pearce,  Polk,  Powell,  Pugh,  Rice,  Saulsbury, 
and  Sebastian— 23. 

"  'Six  Senators  retained  their  seats  and  refund  to  vote,  thus  themselves 
allowing  the  Clark  proposition  to  supplant  ^pCrittenden  resolution  by 
a  vote  of  twenty-five  to  twenty-three.  Mr.  Benjamin,  of  Louisiana;  Mr. 
Hemphill  and  Mr.  Wigfall,  of  Texas ;  Mr.  Iverson,  of  Georgia ;  Mr.  John- 
son,  of  Arkansas ;  and  Mr.  Slidell,  of  Louisiana,  were  in  their  seats,  but 
refused  to  cast  their  votes.' 

"I  sat  right  behind  Mr.  Benjamin,  and  I  am  not  sure  that  my  worthy 
friend  was  not  close  by,  when  he  refused  to  vote;  and  I  said  to  him,  'Mr. 
Benjamin,  why  do  you  not  vote?  Why  not  save  this  proposition,  and 
see  if  we  cannot  bring  the  country  to  it?'  He  gave  me  rather  an  abrupt 
answer,  and  said  he  would  control  his  own  action  without  consulting  me 
or  anybody  else.  Said  I,  *  vote,  and  show  yourself  an  honest  man.'  As 
soon  as  the  vote  was  taken,  he  and  others  telegraphed  South  'We  can- 
not get  any  compromise.'  Here  were  six  Southern  men  refusing  to  vote, 
when  the  amendment  would  have  been  rejected  by  four  majority  if  they 
had  voted.  Who,  then,  has  brought  these  evils  on  the  country  ?  Was 
it  Mr.  Clark?  He  was  acting  out  his  own  policy ;  but  with  the  help  we 
had  from  the  other  side  of  the  Chamber,  if  all  those  on  this  side  had  been 
true  to  the  Constitution  and  faithful  to  their  constituents,  and  had  acted 
with  fidelity  to  the  country,  the  amendment  of  the  Senator  from  New 
Hampshire  could  have  been  voted  down,  the  defeat  of  which,  the  Senator 
from  Delaware  says,  would  have  saved  the  country.  Whose  fault  was 
it?  Who  is  responsible  for  it?  I  think  that  is  not  only  getting  the  nail 
through,  but  clinching  it  on  the  other  side,  and  the  whole  staple  com- 
modity is  taken  out  of  the  speech.  Who  did  it?  Southern  traitors,  as 
was  said  in  the  speech  of  the  Senator  from  California.  They  did  it.  They 
wanted  no  compromise.  They  accomplished  their  object  by  withholding 
their  votes ;  and  hence  the  country  has  been  involved  in  the  present  diffi- 
culty." 

Mark  you,  Mr.  Speaker,  the  men  who  defeated  that  com- 
promise in  the  spirit  of  falsehood  and  misrepresentation  which 
engendered  this  rebellion,  and  which  is  here  and  now  trying 
to  sustain  it,  walked  out  of  the  Hall  and  telegraphed  to  the 
people  they  had  infuriated  that  they  could  get  no  com- 
promise. 

Sir,  this  bill  is  important  in  another  aspect. 

There  are  powers  beyond  the  Atlantic:  France  is  there; 
England  is  there;  and  the  passage  of  this  bill  will  be  an 
announcement  to  all  governments  which  feel  disposed  to- 
meddle  in  our  affairs  that  if  they  attempt  it,  they  will  have 
an  organized  nation  to  meet.  We  will  pass  this  bill  not  as 
a  threat;  we  will  pass  it  because  the  exigencies  of  the  times 
require  it,  and  the  knowledge  that  we  have  passed  it  will 
cross  the  Atlantic  in  twelve  days.  Their  statesmen  will  see 
that  they  had  better  keep  their  fingers  out  of  our  pie,  lest 


16 

they  may  find  concealed  therein  a  steel  strap  with  sudden  and 
fatal  spring.  Let  the  world  know  that  we  have  invested  the 
Government  with  the^ower,  for  three  years  to  come,  of  call- 
ing every  able-bodiedS^n,  who  has  not  upon  himself  the  sup- 
port of  a  widowed  mother,  or  brothers  or  sisters  of  tender  age, 
to  the  defense  of  their  country.  Let  them  understand  that  the 
clergyman  is  to  leave  his  desk,  the  laborer  the  field,  the  mine, 
and  the  workshop,  the  lawyer  his  office,  and  the  legislator  his 
seat,  and  every  other  man  his  vocation.  Let  them  know  that 
we  have  made  up  our  minds,  one  and  all,  to  march  to  the  de- 
fense of  justice  and  liberty,  home  and  country ;  and  that  we 
will,  under  the  Constitution,  and  by  virtue  of  those  powers 
sneered  at  as  the  war  power — those  rights  of  a  belligerent 
which  superadd  themselves  to  the  ordinary  functions  of  the 
Government  whenever  it  engages  in  war — maintain  the  integ- 
rity of  our  Government ;  that  we  will,  if  need  be,  bring  every 
able-bodied  man,  irrespective  of  his  color  or  condition,  into 
the  field;  and  that  the  foreigner  who  dares,  with  unfriendly 
wish,  invade  our  shores  shall  die ;  and  they  will  feel  that  we 
will  not  only  conquer  the  rebellion,  but  that  we  offer  a  fruit- 
less field  for  intervention. 

This  is  what  this  bill  proposes  to  do.  I  care  not  whether 
the  clause  touching  "treasonable  practices"  be  in  or  out  of  it. 
I  act  upon  the  theory  that  self-defense  inheres  in  the  Govern- 
ment as  it  does  in  man,  and  that  those  to  whom  the  Govern- 
ment is  for  the  time  confided  should  be  empowered  to  protect 
it,  and  are  bound  to  punish  all  who  attempt  to  do  it  harm, 
whether  their  intent  is  manifested  by  action  or  by  the  language 
of  conspiracy  leading  to  acts  elsewhere.  It  is  the  law  that  one 
conspirator  may  be  in  one  State,  and  another  in  another,  and 
another  in  still  another  State,  and  all  be  responsible  for  the 
language  used  by  each.  No  question  of  jurisdiction  arises 
there.  A  common  intent  makes  all  who  have  promoted  it 
guilty  of  the  overt  act.  My  judgment  is,  that  where  it  be- 
comes apparent  that  a  man,  with  a  rebellious  heart,  and  sym- 
pathies with  those  who  are  in  arms  against  the  Government,  is 
by  letter  or  word  communicating  with  or  aiding  them,  he 
should  be  dealt  with  as  you  deal  with  a  rattlesnake  when  you 
hear  the  rattle  near  your  heel,  or  as  you  deal  with  a  copper- 
head when  you  perceive  its  venomous  fang  approaching  your 
throat.  You  are  not  to  wait  until  the  sting  is  in  you  before 
you  crush  the  reptile.  You  must  do  it  while  you  can  save 
your  own  life.  Herein  I  charge  the  Government  with  having 


17 

been  in  default.  If  the  example  of  our  revolutionary  sires 
and  of  Andrew  Jackson  had  been  followed,  and  some  of  the 
men  who  now  clamor  and  whine  about,  their  arbitrary  arrests, 
and  tell  how  their  homes  were  violate^  had  been  tried,  allowed 
five  minutes  for  brief  prayer,  and  then  shot  or  hung,  there 
would  have  been  less  treasonable  practices,  and  the  Govern- 
ment would  have  found  support  where  it  now  receives  censure. 
Therein  is  my  objection  to  the  course  of  the  Administration ; 
and  if  it  were  clear  that  this  bill  made  such  conduct  on  their 
part  necessary,  I  should  vote  for  it  even  more  joyously  than  I 
will  to-morrow  on  its  final  passage. 


THE  WAY  TO  ATTAIN  AND  SECURE  PEACE. 

Speech  of  Hon.  W.  D.  Kelley,  of  Pennsylvania,  delivered  in 
the  House  of  Representatives,  December  19,  1862. 

Mr.  CHAIRMAN,  it  seems  to  me  that  before  the  week  closes 
some  rejoinder  should  be  made  to  the  various  suggestions  in 
favor  of  peace  and  compromise,  and  of  hostility  to  the  acts 
and  policy  of  the  President  of  the  United  States,  that  we  have 
been  hearing  from  day  to  day. 

Permit  me  to  say,  sir,  that  I  am  in  favor  of  peace.  I  was 
for  peace  when  I  first  raised  my  voice  in  this  House.  I  was 
then,  as  I  am  now,  for  early  and  enduring  peace — for  peace 
on  terms  honorable  to  the  people  of  the  country,  and  which 
shall  not  dishonor  the  memory  of  the  wise  and  patriotic  men 
who  established  the  independence  and  unity  of  our  country, 
and  ordained  its  beneficent  institutions. 

I  am,  sir,  for  peace  so  secure  that  it  shall  prevail  forever 
over  that  broad  territory  which,  at  the  last  Presidential  elec- 
tion, was  covered  by  thirty-four  State  constitutions,  and  that 
which,  as  territory,  belongs  to  the  United  States,  but  which 
will  come  under  the  jurisdiction  of  States  whose  people  shall 
know  no  sovereignty  save  that  which  resides  in  the  Constitu- 
tion as  it  came  to  us  from  the  fathers.  How,  sir,  can  such  a 
peace  be  attained?  It  can  only  be  done  by  remembering, 
first  and  always,  that  the  supreme  law  of  the  land  is  the  Con- 
stitution of  the  United  States ;  and  that  we,  as  members  of 
this  House,  are  sworn  to  support  that  Constitution ;  and  that 
the  President  of  the  United  States  is  sworn  to  preserve,  pro- 

2 


18 

tect,  and  defend  it.  My  theory  is,  sir,  that  rights  and  duties 
are  things  reciprocal.  So  long  as  the  people  of  a  State  obey 
the  behests  of  the  Constitution,  and  live  in  accordance  with 
them,  they  are  entitled  to  the  enjoyment  of  all  constitutional 
rights.  So  long  as  they  array  themselves  against  them  only 
in  such  force  that  the  marshal  and  his  posse  may  suppress 
their  violent  demonstrations,  they  are  entitled  to  all  those 
rights,  save  as  the  penal  code  properly  applied  may  abridge 
them.  But  when,  as  has  been  the  case  in  the  so-called  se- 
ceding States,  they  assemble  in  organic  conventions  and  throw 
off  all  duty  to  the  Government ;  when  they  abjure  loyalty  and 
duty,  and  claim  to  have  established  on  our  soil  an  independent 
and  foreign  government ;  when  they  attempt  in  the  name  and 
by  the  agency  of  such  alleged  foreign  government,  to  create  a 
navy,  and  do  assemble  armies  to  contend  with  the  power  of 
the  Government,  and  thereby  banish  our  customs  and  postal 
system,  and  close  our  courts,  they  lose  their  title  to  constitu- 
tional rights,  and  it  becomes  the  duty  of  the  Government,  by 
whatever  force  it  may  require,  to  regain  possession  and  control 
of  the  territory  occupied  by  them,  and  to  rule  the  people  occupy- 
ing it  with  such  hostile  purposes,  irrespective  of  State  lines,  or 
State  names,  or  State  institutions,  or  State  constitutions.  It 
must  maintain  the  unity  of  the  country;  and  if  the  inhabitants 
will  disregard  all  their  duties,  it  must  govern  them  under  the 
power  of  the  Constitution  that  makes  the  President  Com- 
mander-in-Chief  of  the  Army  and  Navy  of  the  United  States, 
and  that  requires  him,  if  so  it  must  be,  by  military  force  to 
maintain  the  supremacy  of  the  Government  over  every  acre  of 
our  territory.  When  supreme  jurisdiction  shall  be  thus  estab- 
lished, we  may  say  to  whomsoever  may  occupy  the  country,  or 
particular  portions  of  it,  "Adopt  your  State  constitution, 
whether  the  one  that  formerly  prevailed  or  another ;  open  your 
courts,  and  let  the  courts  of  the  United  States  be  opened ;  let 
our  customs  system  and  our  postal  system  be  enforced ;  avow 
your  allegiance  to  our  Constitution  and  Government,  and  as  you 
shall  perform  the  duties,  enjoy,  also,  the  rights  of  American 
citizens." 

Gentlemen  on  the  other  side  seem  to  forget  that  sworn  duty, 
as  well  as  patriotism  and  the  future  welfare  and  peace  of  the 
country,  demand  the  maintenance  of  the  unity  of  our  territory, 
and  of  the  supremacy  of  the  power  of  the  United  States  over 
it  in  its  entirety.  These  are  things  that  must  be  maintained, 
if  we  would  avoid  standing  armies  and  unceasing  war.  Where 


19 

all  duties  under  the  Constitution  are  rejected,  no  rights  can  be 
claimed,  and  the  Government  must  be  maintained  by  force. 
That  is  my  position,  and  it  is,  I  believe,  the  position  of  the 
loyal  people  of  the  country.  When  I  say  loyal,  I  mean  it ;  as 
I  know  no  conditions  that  may  accompany  its  expression.  That 
loyalty  which  is  conditional  stretches  forth  a  friendly  hand  to 
treason.  Indeed,  conditional  loyalty  is  partial  treason.  The 
President's  emancipation  proclamation  has  been  the  subject  of 
invective  and  denunciation  this  morning,  and  it  has  been  said 
that  no  man  in  the  country,  save  the  President  of  the  United 
States,  believes  that  it  will  promote  peace.  Sir,  has  territory 
ceased  to  be  territory?  Do  figures  still  indicate  numbers  and 
power?  Has  the  lesser  come,  by. some  new  influence,  to  com- 
prehend the  greater  ?  For,  if  it  be  not  so,  the  enforcement  of 
that  proclamation  will  promote  peace  by  aiding  in  the  esta,blish- 
ment  of  the  supremacy  of  the  Government.  Has  not  the  ques- 
tion as  to  whether  four  millions  of  stalwart  people  shall  labor 
for  us  or  for  those  with  whom  we  are  at  war,  some  importance, 
and  a  direct  bearing  on  the  issue  ?  Will  its  solution,  if  it  trans- 
fer them  from  one  side  to  the  other,  have  no  influence  upon  the 
power  of  the  rebellion  ?  I  believe,  with  the  President,  that  it 
will.  There  are  four  millions  of  brawny  right  arms,  mostly 
dark-colored,  but  many  of  them,  through  the  fell  influence  of 
the  hell-born  institution  of  slavery,  fair  as  our  own ;  there  are 
four  millions  of  people  "reluctantly  giving  their  daily  toil  to  the 
support  of  this  rebellion :  and  it  is  proposed  by  the  President 
to  invite  them,  on  the  1st  of  January  next,  as  wisdom  would 
have  done  more  than  a  year  ago,  to  withhold  their  labors  from 
that  cause,  and  bestow  them,  as  they  desire  to,  upon  the  cause 
of  patriotism,  freedom,  and  peace,  under  the  starry  flag  of  our 
country.  Who  will  tell  me  that  the  transfer  of  the  labor  of 
these  people  will  have  no  influence  in  suppressing  the  rebel- 
lion? 

But,  asked  the  eloquent  gentleman  from  Kentucky,  [Mr. 
YEAMAN,]  Who  ever  heard  of  a  belligerent  party  taking  private 
property  on  land?  Let  me  ask  him  a  question:  Who  ever 
heard  of  a  belligerent  prohibiting  the  people  of  the  opposing 
power  from  rallying  to  his  standard?  He  speaks  of  property, 
and  I  speak  of  men.  It  is  a  great  thing,  sir,  to  be  a  man. 

Mr.  YEAMAN.  I  answer  the  gentleman  by  saying  that 
slaves,  so  far  from  being  persons  in  the  eye  of  the  laws  of 
nations,  as  he  treats  them,  while  they  are  actually  persons, 
are,  by  that  Constitution  which  he  has  sworn  to  support,  the 


20 

private  property  of  private  individuals,  and  that  neither  under 
the  Constitution,  nor  under  the  laws  of  nations,  can  you  take 
private  property  on  land  as  an  act  of  war. 

Mr.  KELLBY.  I  take  issue  with  the  gentleman  there,  and  if 
he  will  say  that  they  are  not  designated  in  the  Constitution  as 
"persons,"  or  point  me  to  the  clause  in  which  they  are  desig- 
nated as  property,  I  will  yield  the  point.  The  Constitution 
that  I  have  sworn  to  support  tells  me  that  they — yes,  the 
mothers,  the  fathers  and  the  children  all — are  "  PERSONS  held 
to  service."  They  are  persons  so  held  by  virtue  of  that  Con- 
stitution which  has  been  spurned  and  trampled  and  spit  upon, 
and  yet  he  asks  that  those  who  have  heaped  these  indignities 
upon  that  sacred  instrument  shall  enjoy  to  the  last  iota  the 
rights  of  loyal  men  under  it.  Did  sane  man  ever,  utter  so 
preposterous  a  proposition  before  ?  It  is  the  service  of  these 
people  we  need.  The  proclamation  invites  them  to  our  stand- 
ard. He  characterizes  them  as  property.  I  say,  with  the 
Constitution,  that  they  are  persons,  and  as  such  will  welcome 
them  to  our  support.  Their  advent  to  freedom  will  exclude 
the  necessity  of  the  further  draft  or  conscription  of  our  sons 
and  brothers. 

Sir,  I  was  remarking  that  it  is  a  great  thing  to  be  a  man, 
in  contrast  with  horses,  cows,  and  other  cattle  with  which  these 
poor  people  are  habitually  classified,  and  to  which  they  have 
been  assimilated  by  brutalizing  laws.  Man  chains  the  light- 
ning, makes  the  sun  his  servant,  whitens  the  ocean  with  sails 
— his  messengers  to  the  poles  in  quest  of  knowledge — burdens 
its  great  waves  with  the  commodities  which  his  genius  and  toil 
have  produced  arid  which  he  is  exchanging  for  others,  the  pro- 
ducts of  distant  lands,  more  valuable  to  him.  From  the  con- 
flicting elements,  fire  and  water,  he  generates  a  vapory  power 
that  almost  annihilates  space,  and  practically  removes  mount- 
ains and  levels  valleys ;  and  at  the  close  of  a  life  of  usefulness, 
upon  the  sick-bed,  he  remembers  and  reviews  the  past,  cheers, 
counsels,  and  blesses  those  about  him,  and,  looking  to  heaven, 
feels  that  with  God  he  is  to  live  forever.  The  gentleman  looks 
upon  these  millions  of  persons  as  property — so  do  bad  institu- 
tions pervert  gentle  and  generous  natures.  I  say,  sir,  they 
are  capable  of  all  that  ennobles  man,  and  all  that  endears 
woman  to  man,  and  all  that  opens  to  either  the  great  hereafter 
and  its  blessed  hopes.  It  is  of  these  women,  these  children, 
these  men,  I  speak,  and  I  say  that  he  can  point  to  no  case  in 
which  a  belligerent  has  refused  the  aid  of  such  as  these  when 


21 

engaged  in  a  war  such  as  that  which  now  engrosses  and  ex- 
hausts the  energies  of  this  country.  Sir,  the  only  thing  about 
the  President's  proclamation  that  struck  me  as  amiss  was,  that 
it  was  not,  like  the  lightning,  to  take  instant  effect,  and  that 
its  beneficent  result  should  be  postponed  to  so  distant  a  day. 
Are  these  people,  or  the  relation  in  which  they  stand  to  those 
who  hold  them  to  service,  like  cotton,  leather,  railroad  depots, 
bad  whisky,  and  other  supposed  analogous  things  suggested 
by  the  gentleman  from  Kentucky,  yesterday?  No,  no.  Trace 
back  the  laws  of  war,  so  elaborately  described  by  the  gentleman 
from  Maryland  [Mr.  CRISFIELD]  to-day,  and  you  will  find  that 
the  invading  force  not  only  has  always  welcomed  acquisitions 
from  the  ranks  of  the  enemy,  but  that,  in  the  good  old  days 
of  chivalry,  a  herald  invariably  proceeded  to  the  gates  of  a 
besieged  town  and  offered  immunity  and  protection  to  all  who 
would  join  the  invading  power.  This  chivalric  example  the 
President's  proclamation  pledges  him  to  follow  on  the  coming 
in  of  the  glad  new  year.  Let  us  hail  the  auspicious  day ! 

I  come  back  to  the  question  with  which  I  started.  Will  the 
gentleman  from  Maryland,  [Mr.  CRISFIELD,]  will  the  gentle- 
man from  Kentucky,  [Mr.  YBAMAN,]  will  the  gentleman 
from  Illinois,  [Mr.  RICHARDSON,]  will  any  one  of  these  gen- 
tlemen, or  of  their  learned  coadjutors,  say  that  it  is  not  the 
duty  of  the  President  to  maintain  the  unity  of  the  country 
and  the  supremacy  of  the  Constitution  over  all  our  territory  ? 
And  if  they  will  not  say  that,  is  there  one  of  them  who  will 
say  that  he  was  wrong  in  thus  inviting  four  millions  of  the 
people  of  the  country  to  abandon  rebellion  and  rally  to  the 
standard  of  loyalty,  peace,  and  the  Constitution?  No  one  of 
them,  I  apprehend,  will  say  so.  Than  this,  in  my  judgment, 
mere  sympathy  with  the  rebellion  could  no  further  go.  Gen- 
tlemen deny  that  slavery  was  the  cause  of  this  war.  Let  me 
ask  them  which  one  of  the  non-slaveholding  States,  from  the 
first,  has  proposed  to  participate  in  it,  and  which  one  of  the 
slaveholding  States  has  been  free  from  a  desire  to  participate 
in  it,  or  from  overt  acts  of  rebellion  ?  Why  is  it  that  prevail- 
ing loyalty  and  treason  find  their  boundaries  just  here,  if 
slavery  be  not  the  controlling  influence  ?  I  give  praise  to  the 
Border  States  for  all  they  have  done  on  the  side  of  the  coun- 
try; but  I  remember  that  the  first  of  the  troops  from  my  State 
to  find  service  found  it  in  the  lower  part  of  little  Delaware;  I 
remember  that  Marylanders  were  the  first  to  shed  the  blood  of 
New  England  in  this  unholy  war;  I  remember  that  it  is  but 


22 

recently,  if  indeed  the  question  be  at  all  settled,  that  Ken- 
tucky has  been  able  to  say  with  assurance  that  she  has  given 
more  soldiers  to  the  Union  than  to  the  rebel  army. 

All  honor  and  glory  to  the  men  of  East  Tennessee.  The 
heroic  devotion  to  the  Constitution  they  have  exhibited,  and 
the  barbarous  fcruelties  they  have  endured,  make  a  chapter 
which  even  the  people  of  the  Southern  States  will,  long  years 
hence,  dwell  on,  perhaps  with  mingled  pride  and  pain,  but  with 
more  interest  than  on  any  other  in  American  history.  We 
know  how  terribly  that  State  has  been  ravaged  by  the  prev- 
alence of  the  rebellion  within  its  limits.  And  Missouri,  which 
has  not  only  elected  unconditional  loyalists,  but  unconditional 
emancipationists  to  this  House,  has  also  been  the  bloody  bat- 
tle-field in  which  Missourians  have  been  engaged  in  either 
army.  If  it  be  not  true,  sir,  that  slavery  is  the  root  of  this 
rebellion,  I  ask  some  inspired  man  to  indicate  its  moving 
cause,  for  human  wisdom  cannot  detect  it  elsewhere. 

Now,  can  it  be  possible,  Mr.  Chairman,  that  the  only  right 
so  secured  (on  earth  that  men  cannot  abjure  it,  nor  govern- 
ment divest  them  of  it,  even  to  'save  itself  in  death  struggle, 
is  the  right  of  holding  fellow-beings  in  bondage?  The  propo- 
sition that  we  have  not  the  right  to  invite  these  slaves  to  free- 
dom and  our  standard  involves  just  this  theory — that  the  rebels 
cannot  by  the  most  flagrant  treason  divest  themselves-  of  the 
right  to  hold  these  people  in  bondage;  that  the  people  cannot 
acquire  freedom  for  themselves,  and  that  no  power  in  the  Con- 
stitution, or  in  the  war  power,  or  deducible  from  history  or 
philosophy,  can  relieve  them  from  the  duty  of  assisting  the 
enemies  of  the  country  to  destroy  its  life.  Let  the  arguments 
be  expressed  as  they  may,  with  all  the  eloquence  and  elegance 
with  which  care  and  time  have  clothed  them  in  the  mouths  of 
the  gentlemen  from  Kentucky  and  Maryland,  [Messrs.  YEA- 
MAN  and  CRISFIELD,]  they  come  to  this.  And  until  gentle- 
men can  demonstrate  this  extraordinary  proposition,  they  can- 
not impair  the  force  of  the  President's  proclamation,  in  ac- 
cordance, as  it  is,  with  all  law  and  all  history,  with  the  best 
impulses  of  humanity,  and  the  spirit  of  our  charter  of  freedom, 
and  with  the  growing  tendency  of  our  age.  The  gentleman 
from  Maryland  asks,  "will  this  bring  peace?  Will  the  South 
ever  consent  to  come  in  under  such  an  arrangement?"  Sir,  I 
do  not  propose  to,  nor  ought  the  Government  to  ask  the  South 
on  what  terms  it  will  come  in.  What  the  Government  ought 
to  do,  and  what  I  trust  it  will  do,  is  to  go  straight  forward 


23 

and  establish  its  power  by  crushing  out  all  armed  resistance, 
and  when  that  is  done,  let  it  goyern  the  region  as  a  Territory, 
if  the  people  will  not  establish  their  own  government.  In  this 
condition  let  the  contumacious  remain;  but  whenever  they 
will  establish  governments  for  themselves,  adopt  State  consti- 
tutions, open  the  courts,  elect  Legislatures,  and  by  them  and 
the  people  elect  Senators  and  members  of  Congress,  receive 
them  as  States  into  the  Union,  under  such  designations  as 
they  may  choose,  whether  novel  or  familiar.  By  this  means, 
the  forms  and  vital  principles  of  our  Government  will  be  pre- 
served, and  peace  and  constitutional  freedom  be  secured  to 
the  people  of  distant  ages.  Whenever  this  Government  puts 
forth  its  power  to  the  end  that  it  is  bound  to  assert,  there  will 
be  no  question  as  to  whether  we  mean  to  violate  the  Constitu- 
tion or  whether  the  people  of  the  South  will  accept  the  con- 
stitutional terms  we  offer  them. 

"But,"  said  the  gentleman  this  morning,  "will  the  Border 
States  tolerate  it?"  To  be  sure  they  will.  True,  many  of 
their  citizens  may  dislike  to  see  the  Southern  market  closed 
against  their  human  cattle ;  but  the  rebellion  has  gone  so  far 
that,  with  the  1st  of  January,  slavery  dies  south  of  the  Border 
State  line;  and  when  there  is  no  market  for  men,  women,  and 
children,  south  of  Virginia  and  Kentucky,  slavery  will  have 
small  value  in  any  of  the  Border  States.  I  think  I  see  the 
hand  of  God  in  these  movements.  The  events  of  the  times  are 
deplorable,  indeed;  but  I  know  that  His  providences  are  in- 
scrutable, and  that  He  can  make  the  folly  and  wrath  of  man 
to  praise  Him.  I  had  long  seen  that  if  the  Democratic  party 
could  continue  the  misrule  which  it  had  enforced  on  the  people 
for  years,  and  especially  its  aggressions  upon  the  rights  of  the 
laborers  of  the  country,  a  war  would  come  which  would  be  at 
the  door  of  every  man's  home.  Let  us  look  at  it.  "A  house 
divided  against  itself  cannot  stand,"  quoted  my  friend  from 
Maryland,  and  with  grave  deprecation.  Did  not  the  leaders 
of  the  South  divide  our  house?  Let  us  look  at  it.  Go 
where  you  will,  Mr.  Chairman,  in  our  Northern  States,  you 
find  the  Constitution  of  the  United  States  taught  in  our  ele- 
mentary schools,  and  its  democratic  spirit  everywhere  incul- 
.cated.  You  find  our  youth  growing  up  at  the  foot  of  the 
hustings;  and  the  great  doctrine  taught  to  every  child  is: 
"You  are  as  good  as  any  other  child.  When  you  come  to 
manhood  you  are  to  be  equal,  before  the  State,  of  every  other 
man.  You  must  watch,  guard,  and  maintain  all  your  rights." 


24 

Thus  is  the  democratic  sentiment  stimulated  in  every  school, 
from  every  lecture  stand,  at  every  political  gathering;  and 
the  political  sentiment  of  the  whole  North  is  that  of  individual- 
ism and  equality.  And  once  in  seven  days  comes  the  Sab- 
bath ;  and  from  hillside  and  valley,  from  the  lanes  and  alleys, 
as  well  as  from  the  broad  streets  of  the  city,  the  children 
gather  in  the  church  and  Sunday-School:  there  they  learn 
that  Christianity  enforces  while  it  refines  and  exalts  the  doc- 
trines inculcated  in  the  secular  school;  thus  the  religious  sen- 
timent adds  its  great  power  to  the  political.  "  These  poor  are 
as  good  as  you,"  says  the  teacher.  "  These  blind,  and  lame, 
and  halt,  are  the  children  of  your  Father;  and  inasmuch  as 
you  do  kindness  unto  them,  you  perform  your  duty  unto 
Him."  Thus  the  political  and  religious  sentiments  blend; 
and  theirs  is  an  ever-growing  power.  Of  this  we  have  ample 
evidence  all  over  the  North,  in  the  elaborate  comforts  of 
our  eleemosynary  institutions,  and  the  care  that  is  taken  of 
our  prisoners.  The  deaf,  the  dumb,  the  blind,  the  insane,  are 
cared  for.  Homes  are  established  for  friendless  children, 
where  the  waifs  of  society,  the  offspring  of  the  destitute  and 
fallen,  the  pauper  and  the  felon,  are  cared  for  and  reared  in 
these  teachings  of  democracy  and  Christianity.  Thus  the  sen- 
timent spreads  and  deepens  and  grows. 

We  have  one  institution  in  the  North,  the  outgrowth  of  the 
perpetual  contest  between  labor  and  capital,  that,  could  the 
South  have  carried  its  domination  a  little  further,  would  have 
made  war  and  bloodshed  over  the  whole  country.  It  consists 
of  hardy  working  men,  and  is  known  as  the  trades'  union.  We 
at  the  North  live  by  wages.  Our  men  are  familiar  with  toil ; 
our  women  do  not  shrink  from  it.  We  recognize  the  maxim, 
as  true  to-day  as  the  day  when  it  was  first  written  in  homely 
English: — 

"  Man  labors  from  sun  to  sun, 
But  woman's  work  is  never  done." 

We  all  labor,  and  wages  is  the  foundation  of  the  welfare  and 
abundance  of  our  people.  The  idea  that  induced  this  rebellion 
and  the  supremacy  of  which  could  alone  have  averted  it,  was 
that  slavery  should  be  not  only  extended  into  the  new  Territories 
of  the  country,  but  be  domesticated  in  all  the  States.  It  was 
first  to  be  introduced  into  the  States  by  gentlemen  in  transitu 
with  their  colonies.  The  roll  of  Mr.  Toombs's  slaves  was  to  be 
called  at  the  foot  of  Bunker  Hill.  We  were  told  in  social  in- 


25 

tercourse  in  Philadelphia,  of  Mr.  Yancey,  that  he  would  yet 
visit  Independence  Hall  with  his  slaves.  The  re-establishment 
of  the  right  to  hold  slaves  all  over  the  country  was  the  purpose 
of  the  leaders  of  our  "wayward  sisters."  Nothing  less  would 
satisfy  them.  Sir,  had  that  thing  been  accomplished,  the 
trade  unions  of  the  North  would  either  have  throttled  the 
slaveholders,  or,  under  the  influence  of  the  prejudices  of  caste 
and  color,  throttled  the  unhappy  slaves — perhaps  both.  Here 
let  me  notice  the  remark  of  the  gentleman  from  Maryland, 
that  he  does  not  agree  with  either  of  the  two  factions.  Of 
what  factions  does  he  speak?  The  Governments  of  the  Union 
and  the  Confederacy  ?  Sir,  it  is  the  first  time  I  ever  heard  the 
Government  of  the  United  States  denounced  as  a  faction  in 
the  Halls  of  Congress.  Nor  are  they  who  are  devoting  all 
their  energies  to  the  support  of  the  President  and  the  Consti- 
tution to  be  denounced  as  a  faction.  I  look  in  vain  through 
this  House  for  two  factions. 

I  see  that  the  Government,  with  a  million  of  men,  defending 
itself  and  attempting  to  enforce  its  laws  over  its  own  dominions, 
has  been  resisted  by  a  body  of  armed  rebels,  and  that  those 
who  sympathize  with  them,  in  a  greater  or  less  degree,  are 
attempting  to  embarrass  it ;  but  other  faction  I  have  not  been 
able  to  discover.  There  were  two  factions  before  the  war 
broke  out.  Anterior  to  that  event,  there  was  a  body  of  men 
in  the  North,  who,  under  Christian  impulses,  believing  it  to  be 
a  duty  to  labor  for  the  oppressed,  and  that  it  is  a  crime  to  hold 
men  and  women  in  bondage,  were  willing  to  violate  all  civic 
restraints  in  order  to  give  freedom,  culture,  and  hope  to  the 
slave.  The  Abolitionists  may  have  been  entitled  to  that  epi- 
thet. And  there  were  Southern  men,  on  the  other  hand,  de- 
termined, as  I  -have  indicated,  to  carry  their  institutions  all 
over  the  North — to  make  slavery  national  by  perverting  the 
Constitution.  There  were,  then,  two  factions — devotion  to 
right  and  justice,  perhaps  not  restrained  by  a  proper  prudence 
on  the  one  hand;  and  love  of  lucre,  power,  and  lust,  that 
blotted  out  all  sympathy  with  humanity,  on  the  other,  charac- 
terized the  leaders  of  these  factions. 

Had  the  Southern  faction  been  permitted  to  dominate  until 
the  roll  of  Southern  slaves  had  been  called  in  every  county  in 
every  Northern  State,  there  would  have  broken  out  a  war — a 
war  coextensive  with  the  country,  and  bloody,  at  every 
hearthstone — a  war  which  might  have  been  of  races,  or  in 
which  those  who  claimed  their  human  property  would  have 


26 

suffered  with  their  unhappy  and  proscribed  chattels.  The  white 
men  of  the  North,  who,  from  their  own  hard-earned  and 
hoarded  wages,  will  support  their  unemployed  craftsman  rather 
than  let  him  work  for  under  wages,  would  hardly  have  permitted 
men  to  work  heside  them  for  nothing,  and  throw  their  babies 
as  property  into  the  scale  with  their  unrequited  toil., 

Sir,  I  believe  this  war  was  inevitable.  The  insane  ambition 
and  mad,  craving  lust  of  the  South  could  be  checked  alone  by 
the  results  of  war.  It  had  closed  its  ears  hermetically  against 
the  voice  of  persuasion  and  reason.1  And  wherever  slavery 
existed  that  ambition  and  that  lust  had  root.  Slavery  did 
cause  this  war.  It  was  destined  to  cause  war,  and  if  not  put 
in  process  of  eradication,  will  involve  our  posterity  in  war.  Is 
it  not  fitting,  therefore,  that  the  result  of  the  war  shall  be  the 
end  of  slavery  ?  The  President's  proclamation  does  not  pro- 
pose to  touch  the  institution  in  the  Border  States.  But,  as  I 
have  said,  with  the  market  for  the  annual  crop  gone,  it  will  be 
found  to  be  of  no  more  value  in  Kentucky  than  it  is  now  found 
to  be  in  Missouri,  with  her  free  surroundings.  And  then  we 
will  come  to  what  I  am  prepared  to  say  very  few  words  upon, 
the  compensated  emancipation  proposition  of  the  President. 

The  countless  millions,  the  millions  of  millions  that  we  have 
heard  from  the  other  side  are  to  be  expended  in  compensated 
emancipation,  will  be  somewhat  reduced  when  we  come  to  re- 
member that  it  is  only  the  loyal  men  of  the  Border  States  that 
we  will  have  to  deal  with. 

Missouri  is  here,  asking  $10,000,000  on  condition  that  she 
emancipates  her  slaves  within  a  little  more  than  a  year.  In 
God's  name,  let  us  give  it  to  her;  and  if  Kentucky  and  Mary- 
land make  the  same  claim,  let  us  give  it  to  them,  and  pay  our 
full  share  out  of  the  results  of  our  own  hard  labor  at  the 
North.  Let  us  even,  by  an  addition  to  our  already  grievous 
burden  of  taxes  imposed  by  this  war — slavery's  own  offspring 
— share  the  losses  of  those  whose  slaves  shall  be  exalted  into 
freemen. 

But,  say  the  gentlemen,  the  proclamation  is  unconstitutional 
and  illegal,  and  therefore  void.  I  fear  self-interest  blinds  some 
of  them.  It  is  a  professional  'maxim  that  he  has  a  fool  for  a 
client  who  takes  charge  of  his  own  case.  Certainly,  no  disin- 
terested lawyer  will  dispute  the  validity  of  the  proclamation  of 
the  commander-in-chief  inviting  to  our  flag  people  of  the  rebel 
States,  and  promising  them  protection  and  the  enjoyment  of 
constitutional  rights.  But  will  the  proclamation  be  enforced? 


27 

Yes,  that  is  certain"  as  the  coining  of  the  new  year.  And  I  ask 
the  gentleman  from  Kentucky  [Mr.  YEAMAN]  and  the  gentle- 
man from  Maryland  [Mr.  CRISFIBLD]  to  pause  in  the  career 
they  open  by  their  speeches  of  yesterday  and  to-day.  Both 
profess,  truly  I  doubt  not,  to  desire  peace;  both  assure  us 
that  they  would  give  utterance  to  no  words  that  would  add  to 
the  discord  of  the  country.  Let  them  then  look  the  facts  in 
the  face.  Gentlemen,  do  you  not  see  that  time  and  Provi- 
dence are  conspiring  with  man  to  put  an  end  to  the  sole  source 
of  discord  to  the  country  ?  Do  you  not  see  that  it  was  this  in- 
stitution which  created  division  even  in  the  convention  that 
formed  our  Constitution?  Do  you  not  see  that  it  has  been 
this  institution  that,  from  the  early  settlement  of  the  country 
down  to  the  present  time,  has  produced  more  of  discord  than 
all  other  causes  combined  ? 

The  eloquent  gentleman  from  Kentucky  yesterday  asserted 
that  this  rebellion  had  been  ripening  from  1798.  I  agree  with 
him  that  that  was  one  stand-point  in  its  progress.  The  reso- 
lutions of  1798  marked  a  new  epoch.  But  if  he  will  go  further 
back,  he  will  find,  in  the  debates  of  the  convention  which  framed 
the  Constitution,  abundant  evidence  that  slavery  was  and  had 
been  a  source  of  discord,  and  that  it  came  well-nigh  prevent- 
ing the  establishment  of  a  Union.  It  has  been  a  source  of 
discord  only;,  never  was  it  a  blessing  to  any  State  or  people. 

I  have  no  special  love  for  the  negro.  I  am  proud  of  the 
race  of  which,  by  the  blessing  of  God,  I  am  a  member.  It  is 
not  for  the  negro  that  I  plead.  The  gentleman  from  Illinois 
[Mr.  RICHARDSON]  the  other  day  said  that  all  our  sympathy 
and  all  our  action  was  for  the  negro,  but  not  one  thing  did  we 
propose  to  do  for  the  white  man.  Has  he  never  heard  of  the 
creature — MAN  ?  I  speak  for  man,  the  child  of  God,  irrespec- 
tive of  the  color  of  his  skin. 

Look  at  the  baneful  influence  of  slavery  upon  both  white 
and  black.  You  point  me  to  statistics  from  the  North  to  show 
that  poverty  and  crime  prevail  with  the  negro  there  in  undue 
proportion.  I  point  you  back  to  your  laws  that  made  it  a 
felony  to  teach  him  to  read  and  write,  by  which  he  might  have 
drawn  moral  precepts  and  power  from  the  same  sources  that 
your  white  children  draw  them.  I  point  back  to  the  fact  that 
you  have  never  allowed  him  the  stimulus  of  hope.  I  say  that 
your  accursed  institution,  and  the  cruelty  and  depression  in- 
separable from  it,  have  not.  only  filled  our  jails  with  your 
victims,  but  has  brought  poverty  to  both  races  wherever  it  has 


28 

existed.  Why  is  it  that  Massachusetts,  whose  soil  is  so  thin 
that  the  rocks  peep  through  nearly  every  acre,  like  the  knees 
and  elbows  through  a  beggar's  garment — Massachusetts,  which 
cannot  raise  enough  per  annum  to  feed  her  own  people  for  a 
week — is  yet  rich  and  populous,  while  Maryland,  abounding 
in  agricultural  and  mineral  resources,  to  a  degree  that  few 
States  can  compare  with,  lags  constantly  dragging  in  the 
rear  ?* 

Why  is  it  that  old  Virginia,  possessing,  as  she  did,  the  finest 
harbor  and  leading  sea-port  of  the  country  at  the  time  of  the 
adoption  of  the  Constitution,  with  nobler  rivers  than  flow  through 
any  other  State;  with  mineral  resources  that  California  her- 
self might  envy — untold  wealth  of  iron  and  coal  to  encourage 
and  stimulate  the  influx  of  intelligent  and  enterprising  people 
— lying  nearer  to  the  West  than  other  States  with  fine  har- 
bors; with  every  blessing  that  God  could  lavish  upon  a  terri- 
tory: why  is  it,  I  say,  that  the  Old  Dominion  has  sunk  down 
and  .down,  until  her  own  children  turn  from  their  proud  pre- 
eminence and  sneer  at  her  decrepitude?  Why,  it  was  because 
your  lords  of  the  soil  converted  man  into  property.  It  was 
because  you  banished  hope  from  your  laborers ;  because  you 
did  not  permit  the  toiling  mother  to  love  the  child  she  had 


*  I  extract  the  following  from  a  letter,  dated  Williamsport,  Maryland, 
November  27th,  1862,  addressed  to  me  by  an  officer  of  a  Maryland  regi- 
ment. The  writer  is  a  native  of  that  State : — 

"While  I  am  writing  you,  I  cannot  refrain  from  making  a  statement 
or  two  with  regard  to  the  topography  of  this  part  of  Maryland.  Doubt- 
less you  have  a  correct  knowledge  of  it  generally,  and  perhaps  in  detail ; 
but  no  one  can  know  and  appreciate  it  without  traveling  over  it  and 
through  it.  I  have  gone  over  it  some  in  reconnoitering ;  but  there  are, 
of  course,  many  peculiarities  which  I  have  not  seen.  Its  fertility  is  un- 
surpassed, but  its  chief  characteristic  seems  to  be  its  boundless  water- 
power.  To  say  nothing  of  the  Patapsco,  Monocacy,  Middletown,  Valley 
Creek,  Antietam,  Conococheague,and  many  other  large  streams,  you  meet 
almost  at  the  end  of  every  mile  a  stream  sufficient  to  run  a  gang  of  mills. 
As  I  ride  over  this  country,  the  question  comes  up  in  my  mind,  can  it  be 
possible  that  Providence  ever  designed  that  these  mighty  waters  should 
run  to  waste,  or  that  these  wonderful  natural  facilities  should  always  be 
unavailable?  And  the  answer  comes  back — no!  The  day  will  come 
when  the  busy  hum  of  the  factory  and  the  mighty  clows  of  the  forge- 
hammer  will  be  heard  among  these  mountains;  when  the  exhaustless 
treasures  which  are  hidden  therein  shall  be  brought  forth ;  and  when 
thousands  and  thousands  of  glad  hearts  and  merry  voices  shall  shout  a 
hearty  welcome  to  a  new  era.  To  accept  anything  else,  would  be  equiva- 
lent to  an  acknowledgment  that  God  never  designed  intelligence  and 
industry  to  have  any  part  in  mundane  affairs." 


29 

^     > 

borne  with  assurance  that  it  was  hers  even  through  childhood. 
It  is  this  which  has  made  you  poor,  notwithstanding  your 
mineral  deposits,  your  rivers,  and  your  vast  agricultural  re- 
sources. You  have  made  the  negro  a  curse  to  you ;  for  God 
never  permits  a  great  wrong  to  go  unpunished. 

When,  in  another  year,  Congress  assembles  in  these  halls, 
there  will  be  no  pictures  drawn  such  as  the  gentlemen  have 
furnished  us  with,  of  homes  desolated  or  destroyed,  women 
ravished,  masters  murdered  by  slaves  converted  into  freemen 
and  grateful  for  the  greatest  blessing  of  life.  The  voice  of 
thanksgiving  and  praise  will  come  from  every  heart  to  whom 
freedom  has  been  given.  It  will  come  from  the  white  man  as 
well  as  the  freed  slaves,  in  tones  of  praise  and  hallelujah. 

There  is,  however,  one  thing  the  people  of  the  rebellious 
States  have  to  guard  against.  Of  that  they  must  beware.  Let 
them  not  undertake  to  re-enslave  the  freed  men  that  the  Presi- 
dent of  the  United  States  delivers  by  his  proclamation,  or  woe 
may  betide  them.  Let  them  not  thus  invite  the  horrors  of  St. 
Domingo.  The  voice  of  history  admonishes  them  fully  on  this 
point.  If  they  do,  it  will  be  their  act,  and  not  the  President's 
or  ours.  He  will  make  them  free,  and  they  will  rejoice  in  their 
freedom  and  be  humbly  grateful.  Not  in  the  hour  of  joy  and 
gratitude,  and  when  singing  praises  for  their  deliverance,  is 
the  tiger  let  loose  in  men.  As  God  will  have  wrought  this 
change,  He  will  guide  it.  But  let  man  attempt  to  reverse  His 
providence,  and  who  shall  answer  for  his  folly  ? 


REMARKS  OF  MR.  KELLEY,   OF  PENNSYLVANIA,   ON 
ARMING  THE  NEGROES. 

Delivered  in  the  House  of  Representatives,  January,  1863. 

SIR,  this  is,  in  my  judgment,  a  humane  and  wise  provision 
for  hastening  the  settlement  of  the  war  now  pending;  but  gen- 
tlemen on  the  other  side  find  in  it  an  instigation  to  servile  in- 
surrection, the  degradation  of  our  army,  and  a  blot  upon  our 
legislation  and  history,  which  no  future  glories  can  wipe  out. 
The  distinguished  gentleman  from  Kentucky,  who  first  addressed 
us  to-day,  [Mr.  WICKLIFFE,]  denounces  Hunter's  colored  regi- 


30 
t 

ment  as  a  failure.  From  whom  did  he  hear  that  the  first  regi- 
ment of  South  Carolina  volunteers  have  proved  to  be  a  failure? 
I  know  General  Hunter  to  be  a  man  of  veracity,  and  the  mails 
by  the  last  steamer  from  the  South  tell  us  that  he  addressed 
that  regiment  less  than  a  week  «ago,  saying,  among  other 
things — 

"  I  am  glad  to  be  in  the  midst  of  you,  glad  to  have  seen  so  fine  an  ex- 
hibition of  proficiency  as  you  have  shown  this  day.  I  only  wish  I  had  a 
hundred  thousand  of  you  to  fight  for  the  freedom  of  the  Union." 

He  said  further — and  he  has  had  nearly  a  year  of  observa- 
tion, and  is  a  man  familiar  with  military  history — 

"  I  see  no  reason  why  you  should  not  make  as  good  soldiers  as  any  in 
the  world,  and  I  trust  that  upon  all  occasions  you  will  be  found  willing 
to  do  your  whole  duty." 

The  gentlemen  from  Illinois,  Indiana,  and  Ohio  have  told  us 
of  the  courage  and  endurance  exhibited  by  colored  soldiers  and 
sailors  in  the  earlier  wars  of  the  country,  and  on  several  occa- 
sions in  this.  May  I  not  remind  you  that  it  is  now,  sir,  just  a 
year  since  I  had  the  honor  of  calling  the  attention  of  the  House 
to  an  extract  from  a  letter  from  Commodore  Dupont?  It  was 
when  the  country  was  still  thrilling  with  the  glory  of  the  naval 
action  at  Port  Royal.  I  read  from  that  letter  the  expression 
of  his  gratitude  to  the  "contrabands"  who  rallied  around  him, 
and  his  declaration  that — 

"They  serve  us  with  zeal,  make  no  bargains  for  their  remuneration, 
go  under  fire  without  the  slightest  hesitation ;  and,  indeed,  in  our  cause 
are  as  '  insensible  to  fear'  as  Governor  Pickens.  Some  of  them  are  very 
intelligent." 

But,  asks  the  venerable  gentleman  from  Kentucky,  who  last 
addressed  us,  [Mr.  CRITTENDBN,]  what  is  the  reason  for  want- 
ing these  colored  men?  This  is  the  reason.  It  is  not  only  the 
duty  of  the  President  to  maintain  the  supremacy  of  the  power 
of  the  United  States  over  all  its  territory,  but,  sir,  it  is  part  of 
the  providence  of  God  that  that  supremacy  should  be  main- 
tained. You  find  that  providence  written  in  the  topography  of 


31 

the  country ;  you  find  it  in  the  institutions  of  the  country ;  you 
find  it  in  our  national  progress  and  development.  Look  with 
the  eye  of  the  philosopher  or  statesman  over  the  surface  of  our 
grand  country;  scan  the  lay  of  its  mountains,  the  courses  of 
its  rivers,  or  search  our  history,  and  everywhere  you  will  find 
it  written  by  the  hand  of  God  that  the  territory  now  occupied 
by  the  United  States  was  destined  from  the  beginning  for  the 
home  of  one  people,  to  be  presided  over  by  one  government. 
It  is  necessary  that  this  government  be  maintained  in  this 
crisis;  and  it  is  not  fair,  to  say  the  least,  that,  in  a  war  the 
results  of  which  are  to  bless  both  North  and  South — a  war 
which,  if  well  fought  out,  is  to  bless  the  generations  that  shall 
dwell  through  all  time  in  this  vast  country  of  ours,  all  the 
hardships  and  privations  should  be  borne  by  the  people  of  the 
Northern  States  alone.  This  bill  authorizes  the  President  of 
the  United  States  to  call  upon  the  people  occupying  the  terri- 
tory in  rebellion  for  their  quota  of  the  army.  And  why  shall 
they  not  yield  it  ?  Why  shall  not  all.  that  territory  send  as  fair 
a  percentage  of  its  people  to  war  for  the  Union  as  the  State  of 
Rhode  Island,  or  its  neighbor  of  grander  dimensions,  New 
York?  Will  the  gentleman  answer  that  question?  Where  are 
the  South  Carolinians  rallying  under  the  Union  flag;  the 
Georgians,  the  Mississipians,  the  men  of  any  of  the  eleven 
States  in  rebellion?  And  does  he  mean  to  say  that  the  stain 
and  infamy  of  this  rebellion  shall  forever  attach  to  the  South — 
that  it  shall  not  be  wiped  out  by  the  loyal  men  of  that  section  ? 
God  forbid  it!  We  never  could  dwell  together  as  brethren 
again  were  it  not  that  we  mean  to  let  the  men  of  the  South  do 
their  share  in  restoring  their  own  government.  Let  the  loyal 
men  of  the  South  take  a  full  part  in  this  war,  and  subjugation 
will  be  deprived  of  its  power  to  embitter  the  future  of  the 
nation.  The  North  cannot  indulge  in  the  exultation  of  con- 
querors if  she  sliall  but  have  assisted  the  loyal  men  of  the 
South  to  maintain  a  common  blessing. 

Sir,  there  is  philosophic  and  patriotic  reason  why  the  Pres- 
ident should  bring  from  all  these  whilom  States  their  fair  quota 


32 

of  the  army  of  freedom  and  the  Constitution.  But  let  me, 
waiving  these  for  the  time,  consider  some  simple  questions. 
Why  should  it  not  be  done?  Is  the  life  of  the  negro  more 
sacred  than  that  of  the  white  man  ?  Why  should  not  Amer- 
ican Africans  encounter  the  power  of  the  enemy  and  the  ma- 
laria of  the  swamps  ?  Why  should  your  son,  and  my  brother, 
and  our  friends  die  that  the  negro  may  live  ?  I  do  not  esteem 
him  one  whit  better  than  ourselves ;  nor  do  I  deny  that  he  is  our 
equal  in  rights  before  the  great  God  our  common  Father,  and 
in  the  great  forum  where  absolute  justice  prevails.  I  assert  that 
he  is  not  better  than  we,  and  should  share  the  dangers  and  suf- 
ferings of  this  war.  I  ask,  again,  is  it  more  essential  to  the 
slave's  wife  or  to  the  free  colored  man's  that  he  should  protect 
and  shelter  her,  to  his  children,  that  he  should  watch  over 
them,  than  it  is  to  the  white  wife  and  children  of  the  loyal 
States  that  they  should  enjoy  the  care  and  affection  of  husband 
and  father;  and  is  it  upon  this  assumption  that  Democrats  and 
gentlemen  from  the  Border  States  will  not  allow  his  sacred 
person  to  encounter  the  risks  of  the  deck  of  a  man-of-war,  or 
of  storming  the  breastwork  or  the  battery?  If  this  reason  in- 
fluences them  it  is  a  new-found  faith.  They  have  at  least  not 
shown  devotion  to  it  in  the  past.  If  one  of  them  wanted  to 
give  a  dinner-party,  and  had  not  ready  cash,  under  the  laws 
and  civilization  which  have  moulded  their  sentiments,  he  could 
put  a  wife  and  mother  upon  the  auction  block,  and  leave  her 
children  orphaned  for  all  time,  and  her  husband  to  pine  for 
the  one  being  that  he  loved.  No,  the  slave  is  only  important 
to  his  wife  and  child  as  the  thing  around  which  their  affections 
cling.  He  is  alike  powerless  to  protect  her  or  provide  nurture 
for  them:  but  our  Northern  laboring  man  is  the  head  of  a 
family  and  home ;  it  is  upon  his  labor  that  his  wife  depends  to 
make  the  home  comfortable  and  cheerful,  and  it  is  by  the  aid 
of  his  labor  that  the  humble  boy  is  to  climb  the  hill  from  pov- 
erty to  wealth,  from  ignorance  to  learning,  from  obscurity,  it 
may  be,  to  fame.  Why,  then,  shall  not  the  black  man  leave 
wife  and  child  for  this  war  as  well  as  the  white  man  ? 


S3 

Or  do  gentlemen  strive  to  defeat  this  bill  because  they  deem 
it  important  that  the  rebels  shall  have  a  more  adequate  supply 
of  labor  than  we  ?  They  all  know  that  every  white  company 
recruited  takes  our  laborers  from  the  field,  the  mine,  the  work- 
shop. Do  they  not  know  that  our  power  at  home  is  impaired 
in  the  ratio  of  the  power  and  consistency  of  the  regiment  or 
division?  Has  not  their  whole  policy  been  to  deprive  us  of 
labor,  of  strength  at  home,  of  character,  and  to  secure  to  our 
enemies  a  supply  of  labor  to  maintain  them,  while  they  cut  our 
throats,  and  rob  the  graves  of  our  soldiers  that  they  may  make 
trinkets  for  ladies'  girdles  of  their  bones  ?  Let  the  laborers  of 
the  rebels  strike  for  freedom,  not  in  lawless  insurrection,  but 
under  the  guidance  of  officers  who  receive  their  orders  from  the 
Executive  mansion  of  the  United  States.  But,  says  the  venerable 
gentleman  from  Kentucky,  [Mr.  CRITTENDEN,]  even  Catiline 
refused  to  employ  slaves  in  war.  Catiline,  sir,  was  a  bad  man, 
a  base  man,  a  rebel  and  conspirator ;  but  how  infinitely  glorious 
he  stands  beside  the  leaders  of  this  rebellion,  if  the  gentleman's 
statements  and  impressions  be  correct,  for  they  have  done  from 
the  start,  what  he  tells  us  Catiline  was  not  base  enough  to  do, 
brought  their  slaves  into  the  field  against  their  brethren !  I 
have  been  calling  them  Catilines.  I  beg  pardon  of  the  shade 
of  Catiline  for  associating  his  name  with  those  of  villains  of  so 
much  deeper  dye. 

The  gentleman  smoothly  commenced  by  saying,  "it  is  true, 
that  gentlemen,  by  sedulously  studying  history,  have  discov-, 
ered  a  few  cases  in  which  the  negro  has  served  faithfully  in 
military  matters."  By  sedulously  studying  history  ?  Has  the 
gentleman  ever  heard  that  there  is  an  empire  called  British 
India?  If  he  has,  I  tell  him  that  a  race  blacker  than  the 
children  of  our  rebel  brethren,  black  as  the  stock  from  which 
they  got  them,  won  for  England  British  India.  Does  the  gen- 
tleman's historical  reading  all  antedate  this  century?  Does  he 
not  know  that  in  the  last  glories  which  crowned  the  valor  of 
European  arms,  the  Turcos  were  honored  by  all  their  com- 
panions for  the  skill  and  reckless  courage  with  which  they  led 

3 


34 

every  forlorn  hope?  and  these  Turcos  had  not  enjoyed  for  two 
hundred  years  the  christianizing  influence  of  American  slavery. 
They  were  the  fresh  material  of  which  our  slaves  of  lighter 
hue  are  partially  made.  Where,  let  me,  as  the  champion  in 
this  contest  of  a  down-trodden  race,  ask  him — and  I  will  give 
him  the  remainder  of  the  session  to  answer — have  arms  ever 
been  placed  in  their  hands,  and  they  brought  fairly  into  the 
field,  and  failed  the  power  which  relied  upon  them  ?  I  ask  for 
a  single  case.  One  of  the  earliest  play-grounds  of  my  child- 
hood was  a  spot  in  Jersey — not  the  State  of  my  nativity,  but 
of  my  paternal  ancestors — called  Red  Bank ;  and,  as  I  learned 
at  the  knees  of  others  the  history  of  my  country,  and  what 
made  that  spot  sacred,  perhaps  a  little  of  what  the  gentleman 
calls  abolition  was  infused  into  me,  for  there  I  learned  that 
when  Donop  was  pursuing  the  broken  American  forces,  a  black 
battalion  stepped  in  and  redeemed  the  fortunes  of  the  day.  I 
think  that  battalion,  Mr.  Speaker,  was  led  by  a  citizen  of  your 
State,  Rhode  Island.  Where,  I  ask,  in  our  history  or  any 
other,  has  the  down-trodden  race  failed  on  the  battle-field  to 
show  that  it  has  been  its  affectionate  humanity  that  has  kept 
its  terrific  courage  in  check  through  centuries  of  wrong  and 
oppression  ? 

But  the  gentleman  asks,  will  you  turn  loose  this  terrible 
population  to  make  insurrection?  No,  sir.  I  would  not  with- 
draw from  that  race  the  promised  word  of  hope.  I  would  not 
do  with  them,  since  the  President's  proclamation  has  been 
made  known  to  them,  what  the  French  undertook  to  do  in  St. 
Domingo.  I  would  not,  after  having  quickened  their  pulses 
by  the  word  "freedom,"  and  taught  them  to  gaze  at  hope's 
star  with  tearless  eye,  madden  them  by  saying,  "You  are 
slaves  again,  and  incapable  of  being  free.  You  must  win  by 
indiscriminate  slaughter  your  freedom,  or  remain  in  slavery 
forever."  I  would  bring  the  loyal  men  of  South  Carolina, 
North  Carolina,  Texas,  and  every  rebellious  State,  however 
black  they  may  be,  under  the  flag  of  the  nation,  and  under 
military  discipline.  I  would  give  them  wages,  and  train  them 


35 

to  the  habits  of  freemen;  and  while  they  cement  with  their 
blood,  and  raise  anew  by  their  courage,  the  great  temple  of 
American  freedom,  our  women  will  'care  for  their  women  and 
benighted  children,  and  carry  to  them  that  truth  so  mighty  to 
us,  that  there  is  a  God,  and  that  they,  too,  are  the  subjects  of 
redeeming  grace.  Our  women  in  the  North  never  see  poverty, 
ignorance,  or  suffering,  which  they  do  not  strive  to  mitigate 
and  soothe ;  and,  by  the  end  of  the  five  years,  which  the  gen- 
tleman from  Kentucky  thinks  so  horrible  a  period,  there  will 
be  developed  a  race  of  negroes  who  will  know  that  there  are 
figures  and  letters  and  words,  and  will  know,  too,  what  few  of 
them  do  in  any  fair  sense,  that  there  is  for  them  hope  and 
prosperity  in  this  world,  and  immortality  beyond  the  grave. 

I  fear  not  a  standing  army  of  a  particular  color.  I  fear  a 
standing  army.  I  tell  the  gentleman  that  this  country  was 
not  made  for  a, particular  generation,  or  for  a  particular  num- 
ber of  the  members  of  a  generation.  It  was  made  for  those 
who  shall  occupy  it  through  all  time;  and  if  Eli  Thayer  can 
lead  five  thousand  free  Germans  into  Florida,  in  God's  name 
let  him  take  them  there.  The  gentleman  [Mr.  WICKLIFFB] 
said  they  would  starve  there,  and  he  pictured  it  as  a  land  of 
stone  and  swamp,  if  I  heard  him  right.  I  have  deemed  it  one 
of  the  fairest  lands  in  God's  world.  But,  sir,  be  it  all  that  he 
describes  it,  let  white  labor  go  there,  and  make  the  black 
laborer  on  the  soil  free,  and  you  will  find  it  to  bloom  and  bear 
as  rocky  Massachusetts  does.  If  it  be  all  that  the  gentleman 
describes  it,  free  labor  will  there  vindicate  the  truth  of  the 
maxim  that  "plant  slavery  in  a  garden,  and  it  will  become  a 
desert ;  plant  free  labor  in  a  desert,  and  it  will  become  a  gar- 
den." Let  them  go  and  settle  the  country.  The  great  ob- 
ject of  this  war,  as  I  have  said,  is  to  maintain  the  life  of  the 
nation,  and  to  give  to  the  people  of  the  future  those  beneficent 
institutions  which,  in  eighty  years,  have  made  us  the  first  power 
in  the  world  physically,  and  given  us  of  the  free  States  a  civ- 
ilization trascendently  above  the  highest  known  elsewhere;  to. 
save  these  institutions  and  this  system,  and  to  perpetuate  them 


36 

so  long  as  God  reigns,  and  man  lives  on  earth.  If  we  do  but 
fight  out  this  war  safely,  we  will  secure  to  all  the  millions,  the 
hundreds,  nay,  probably  the  thousands  of  millions  who  shall 
dwell  here,  peace,  liberty,  hope,  and  the  results  of  these. 

Sir,  I  am  but  a  poor  and  feeble  civilian.  I  have  done  little 
duty  of  a  military  character  in  my  life.  But  this  glimpse  at 
the  future  grandeur  of  my  country  recalls  one  night  of  mil- 
itary duty  to  my  memory.  I  had  the  honor,  Mr.  Speaker,  of 
being  an  humble  member  of  that  great  body  of  the  people  of 
Pennsylvania  who  rushed  to  the  southern  frontier  of  Western 
Maryland,  to  protect  the  boundary  of  their  own  State,  and,  as 
it  proved,  the  flank  of  that  great  and  gallant  army  which  was 
then  supposed  to  have  won  a  decisive  victory  at  Antietam.  It 
;may  not  be  generally  known  that  the  militia  of  Pennsylvania 
protected  the  flank  of  that  army  from  Friday  noon  till  Sunday 
at  eleven  o'clock.  It  was  during  that  time  that  I  lay  down 
one  night,  carbine  in  hand,  and  gazed  at  the  Milky  Way  with 
its  innumerable  myriads  of  stars ;  and  while  I  thought  of  home 
and  family,  and  of  the  apparent  folly  of  a  man  who,  until  then, 
had  scarcely  known  how  to  handle  the  weapon  he  held,  rushing 
to  such  a  post,  I  also  thought  of  the  grandeur  of  my  country, 
and  of  its  immense  future.  I  felt,  sir,  that  in  this  great  strug- 
gle the  life  of  the  best-loved  or  greatest  of  us  all,  or  the  sorrow  of 
families,  was  no  more  in  comparison  with  the  cause  than  was  the 
smallest  star  in  all  that  immense  multitude  to  the  sum  of  the  ma- 
terial universe.  And  I  have  felt  since  that  hour  that  to  secure 
the  peace  and  unity  of  the  country  I  would  sacrifice  the  lives  of 
the  grandest  and  most  delicate  by  thousands,  and  of  the  power- 
ful and  muscular  and  least  valuable  by  tens  of  thousands. 
We  must  secure  peace  by  achieving  supremacy  at  whatever 
cost.  But  let  not  the  North  be  asked  to  do  it  all.  Authorize 
the  President  to  call  upon  the  rebellious  territory  to  furnish  its 
fair  quota.  Arm,  equip,  and  pay  those  who  respond  to  his 
call.  And  when  you  have  done  so,  the  rebellion  will  end. 
These  gentlemen  will  no  longer  be  able  to  serve  the  rebellion 
by  protecting  the  laborers  of  rebels,  and  thus  furnishing  them 


37 

with  men  to  handle  their  cannon,  dig  their  trenches,  grow 
their  food,  make  their  clothes,  and  serve — as  the  record  shows 
they  have  served  throughout  the  war — in  fighting  their  battles. 
Let  gentlemen  show  the  country,  if  they  can,  that  it  is  better 
negroes  should  shoot  loyal  men  than  traitors ;  and  when  they 
have  done  so,  let  them  take  out  a  patent  for  their  own  loyalty. 


LETTER  FROM  SECRETARY  CHASE. 

WASHINGTON,  April  9,  1863. 

GENTLEMEN:  Imperative  demands  on  my  time  compel  me  to 
deny  myself  the  gratification  of  attending  the  meeting  to  which 
you  kindly  invite  me. 

You  will  meet  to  send  words  of  cheer  to  our  brave  generals 
and  soldiers  in  the  field,  to  rebuke  treason  in  our  midst,  giv- 
ing, in  the  garb  of  peace,  aid  and  comfort  to  treason  in  the 
panoply  of  war,  to  maintain  inviolate  the  integrity  of  the  na- 
tional territory  and  the  supremacy  of  the  national  Constitution 
and  laws,  to  strengthen  the  hands  and  nerve  the  heart  of  the 
President  for  the  great  work  to  which  God  and  the  people  have 
called  him.  For  what  other  purpose  can  American  citizens 
now  assemble? 

It  is  my  fixed  faith,  gentlemen,  that  God  does  not  mean 
that  this  American  Republic  shall  perish.  We  are  tried  as  by 
fire,  but  our  country  will  live.  Notwithstanding  all  the  vio- 
lence and  the  machinations  of  traitors  and  their  sympathizers, 
on  this  or  the  other  side  of  the  Atlantic,  our  country  will 
live. 

And  while  our  country  lives,  slavery,  the  chief  source,  and 
cause,  and  agent  of  our  ills,  will  die.  The  friends  of  the  Union 
in  the  South,  before  the  rebellion,  predicted  the  destruction  of 
slavery  as  a  consequence  of  secession,  if  that  madness  should 
prevail.  Nothing,  in  my  judgment,  is  more  certain  than  the 
•fulfillment  of  these  predictions.  Safe  in  the  States  before  re- 


38 

bellion,  from  all  Federal  interference,  slavery  has  come  out 
from  its  shelter  under  State  Constitutions  and  laws  to  assail 
the  national  life.  It  will  surely  die,  pierced  by  its  own  fangs 
and  stings. 

What  matter,  now,  how  it  dies  ?  Whether  as  a  consequence 
or  object  of  the  war,  what  matter?  Is  this  a  time  to  split  hairs 
of  logic  ?  To  me  it  seems  that  Providence  indicates  clearly 
enough  how  the  end  of  slavery  must  come.  It  comes  in  rebel 
Slave  States  by  military  order,  decree,  or  proclamation,  not 
to  be  disregarded  or  set  aside,  in  any  event,  as  a  nullity,  but 
maintained  and  executed  with  perfect  good  faith  to  all  the  en- 
franchised, and  it  will  come  in  loyal  Slave  States  by  the  un- 
constrained action  of  the  people  and  their  legislators,  aided 
freely  and  generously  by  their  brethren  of  the  Free  States. 
I  may  be  mistaken  in  this,  but  if  I  am,  another  better  way  will 
be  revealed. 

Meantime,  it  seems  to  me  very  necessary  to  say  distinctly, 
what  many  yet  shrink  from  saying.  The  American  blacks  must 
be  called  into  this  conflict,  not  as  cattle,  not  now,  even  as  con- 
trabands, but  as  men.  In  the  Free  States  and  by  the  procla- 
mation, in  the  rebel  States,  they  are  free  men.  The  Attorney- 
General,  in  an  opinion  which  defies  refutation,  has  pronounced 
these  freedmen  citizens  of  the  United  States.  Let  then  the 
example  of  Andrew  Jackson,  who  did  not  hesitate  to  oppose 
colored  regiments  to  British  invasion,  be  now  fearlessly  followed. 
Let  those  blacks,  acclimated,  familiar  with  the  country,  capable 
of  great  endurance,  receive  suitable  military  organization,  and 
do  their  part.  We  need  their  good- will,  and  must  make  them 
our  friends;  we  must  have  them  for  guides,  for  scouts,  for  all 
military  service  in  camp  or  field  for  which  they  are  qualified. 
Thus  employed,  from  a  burden,  they  will  become  a  support, 
and  the  hazards,  privations,  and  labors  of  the  white  soldiers 
will  be  proportionably  diminished. 

Some  one  will  object,  of  course.  There  are  always  objectors 
to  everything  practical.  Let  experience  dispel  honest  fears, 
and  refute  captious  or  disloyal  cavil. 


39  % 

Above  all,  gentlemen,  let  no  doubt  rest  on  our  resolution  to 
sustain,  with  all  our  hearts,  and  with  all  our  means,  the  sol- 
diers now  in  arms  for  the  Republic.  Let  their  ranks  be  filled 
up ;  let  their  supplies  be  sufficient  and  regular ;  let  their  pay 
be  sure.  Let  nothing  be  wanting  to  them  which  can  insure 
activity  and  efficiency.  Let  each  brave  officer  and  man  realize 
that  his  country's  love  attends  him,  and  that  his  country's  hopes 
hang  on  him,  and,  inspired  by  this  thought,  let  him  dare  and 
do  all  that  is  possible  to  be  dared  and  done. 

So,  gentlemen,  with  the  blessing  of  God,  we  will  make  a 
glorious  future.  I  see  it  rising  before  me — how  beautiful  and 
grand !  There  is  not  time  to  speak  of  it  now :  but  from  all 
quarters  of  the  land  comes  the  voice  of  the  sovereign  people 
rebuking  faction,  denouncing  treason,  and  proclaiming  the  in- 
divisible unity  of  the  Republic,  and  in  the  Heaven-inspired 
union  of  the  people  for  the  sake  of  the  Union  is  the  sure 
promise  of  that  splendid  hereafter. 

With  great  respect,  yours  very  truly, 

S.  P.  CHASE. 


Hollinger  Corp. 
pH8.5 


